


All We Do

by droid_girl



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Infidelity, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2018-02-03
Packaged: 2019-02-23 18:35:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13196130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/droid_girl/pseuds/droid_girl
Summary: Jaime Lannister, an aging actor in his forties finds himself taking on a role in a low-budget indie film, detailing an ill-fated love affair that starts up between two friends. When he meets Sansa Stark, writer behind the story upon which the script is based, he finds himself drawn to her...When he finds out that the story is based on her actual disastrous past, Jaime finds himself seeing double. It doesn't help that he finds himself falling both for the woman in front of him, and the woman in the pages of his script...Modern AU





	1. Feel the Fade

**Author's Note:**

> I don't often ask for comments/feedback (not that I don't like feedback, I just feel very shy about it). But in this case, I actually would appreciate any and all feedback you can offer. Brutalize me if you want. Seriously.
> 
> Feel free to say “dude delete this”

_I’ve been upside down, I don’t wanna be the right way round - Oh Wonder_

***  
Chapter 1

In a summer when the whole world spoke of nothing much outside of its own destruction, Jaime Lannister selfishly and silently wondered that perhaps it wasn’t really the planet going to hell…just life, as he knew it.

Most people likely wouldn’t agree with him, but most people who weren’t him, had no idea how scary the future appeared from his vantage point.

The sixth and final season of the hit sci-fi show which he starred in was still in the middle of filming, but already, he was feeling a very familiar anxiety creeping across his skin.

Frankly, it wasn’t something he had anticipated, that old apprehension. _Wyvern_ was supposed to be his big break, the project that made his career, and to a huge extent, it had accomplished almost all of that, albeit, in a rather niche category of the entertainment industry.

Regardless, having taken more than one hard look at his prospects, Jaime was forced to confront the uncomfortable fact that once the season aired, and the finale credits rolled, he would officially be out of a job.

Sure, he wouldn’t be dead broke this time, living on the rollout couch of his old college roommate. (It wasn’t like his father was interested in housing his disappointment of a son, who chose an acting career over the family business.) A decent investment portfolio would likely keep him in the green for the rest of his life, so long as he didn’t start buying luxury yachts every two weeks.

Still - unemployed was unemployed, and as an actor on the wrong side of forty, he understood that his chances of finding greater, or even similar success in other work, would continue diminishing by the day, if not the second. Worse, he could become a second rate Mark Hamill, and the only thing he’d ever really be known as, would be Captain Ray Quentin, alpha male space commander.

While it was true there were some directors who seemed interested in at least starting conversations with him, as his agent warned with brutal honesty, it was likely a lot of those discussions wouldn’t pan out past a quick meeting.

“You’re currently Captain Ray Quentin, commander of a spaceship called _Wyvern_ , drifting through the awesome and terrifying cosmos, battling threats to humanity.” Tyrion had told him in between monstrous bites of his lunch. “It’s going to take a few years before people can see you as anyone different.”

“Are you suggesting I sit around and do nothing?” Jaime asked picking dispiritedly at his limp salad.

“Not nothing. Stop overreacting. I’ll make sure you get a couple of films under your belt, make sure you get a few interviews…and then in two years, once the _Wyvern_ craze is over, I’m sure someone else will pick you up for something big.”

Tyrion didn’t sound sure. In fact, the way his mismatched eyes kept shifting from side to side, Jaime was certain his friend, who also happened to be his agent, was lying. Not out of spite, obviously - the other man just didn’t want to freak his client out.

“Dude, you keep saying you’ve not had a life in years, what with _Wyvern_ literally eating up all your time.” the other man wiped at his mouth with a crisp linen napkin.

“That’s literally not how you should ever use the word ‘literally’,” Jaime ran a hand through his blonde hair in frustration. Silver was beginning to pepper his hair, and he hadn’t yet decided how he felt about this development. On one hand, he wondered if he would start fitting the role of the dignified older man who scored all the attractive women. On the other, he suspected he simply looked like a massive man-child.

“Shit like that is why I’m your only friend.” Tyrion rolled his eyes. “But why don’t you just…appreciate the freedom for a bit? Travel, or I dunno, get _laid_. It’s not like you’ve seriously seen anybody in the past three years. Or even casually. Not since Cersei left, that bitch.”

“Ugh.” was all he could muster by way of response at his agent.

“What about all those projects you’ve got going on. All that climate change stuff…”

“I gave that up.” he said gloomily. “Everyone who works on those types of things, are either insanely narcissistic, or insanely clever. I simply don’t have the energy for those levels of self obsession, and I’m not very bright. Tyrion, maybe we should just take whatever comes next…”

“Jaime, you could either become Adam Sandler, or you could become that bald guy from Star Trek.”

“Patrick Stewart. You mean Patrick Stewart.” Jaime sank his face into his hands. “How are you in the entertainment industry?”

“I dunno. I started off being a literary agent. This whole thing kinda found me,” Tyrion admitted. “To be really honest, I was hoping to uncover the next great author of our time.”

“How awful for you to be stuck in this swamp of terrible piles of money,” the actor stated.

“You don’t pay me as much as you think you do. No seriously, I depend on the other talent in my contact list who I don’t make time for, and who I don’t consider actual friends.” Tyrion smirked and stood up. “Relax. It’ll be fine. I promise.”

***

There was a bit of radio silence after that, at least on the job front. It took every iota of his willpower not to harangue Tyrion about it every time they hung out, and mostly, he was successful.

By the time the final days of filming Wyvern rolled around, Jaime began seriously wondering if his acting days were in fact, finished. It was two months after that lunch time conversation, before his agent called with something solid.

“Got something.”

“Oh?” the actor perked up. It was leg day, and leg day was boring day; a phone call from his agent from a welcome distraction. Stepping away from his personal equipment, he paced the width of the room.

“Yeah. Indie flick, based on a novella…I would say its a rom-com except its not funny and kinda has a super depressing ending. Lots of romance-ish stuff though.” Tyrion said. The actor could hear the other man typing furiously on his laptop.

“A novella?” Jaime asked suspiciously.

“A novella is somewhere between a short story and a full length novel. The word count is usually at…”

“You’re a dick.”

“Glad we’ve established that. Anyway, it was optioned sometime ago, and a small producer’s actually picked it up…the author had one tiny request.” Tyrion was smirking, Jaime knew.

“That’s…worrisome…” the actor stared out the window at the city below. “I thought authors didn’t get a say in these things.”

“Maybe,” Tyrion said happily. “She’s a bit of a _Wyvern_ fan - basically told her people she thinks you’re perfect for the role.”

“Oh god, she sounds like a crazy fangirl.” Jaime slapped at his forehead. “I swear to god, if this is some sort of Hunger Games fanfiction adaptation…”

“You should be so lucky.” Tyrion said drily. “She’s not crazy. A friend of mine happens to represent her. Or used to. I spoke with the writer in person. Sansa’s actually the farthest thing from crazy. A little quirky, maybe. Cute too…”

“You sound like you have a crush on her. Are you sure you’re not using this as an opportunity to get a date out of this?”

“That’s totally besides the point,” Tyrion sounded sheepish, before he added quickly, “Seriously, it’s a good story. I liked it. It won’t win any major awards, but it’ll be one of those indie flicks that’ll get some sort of critical recognition. You won’t even need to audition - they want the biggest name they can afford and since you’ve been chomping at the bit...”

“Fine.” Jaime said, deciding he’d rather be working than sitting around, thinking of that golden age when he still had a job. “Sure.”

“Awesome. We’ll get this set up. You should grab a copy of the novella if you can - it’s called _The Friendship Agreement_.” Tyrion sounded relieved. “There’s a bit of a commitment on the physical side of things.”

“The kind where I get to eat all the junk food I want?” Jaime brightened up hopefully.

“Yeah right. You’re an actor. You know what you signed up for.” the guy chortled.

He really needed better friends, Jaime scowled.

***

_The Friendship Agreement (excerpt)_

_It was the coldest day of 2014, and Alayne Stone was freezing and exhausted. It had been a long week dealing with assholes while wearing a huge smile, and her face was literally hurting from the effort. Who knew being a consultant was almost exactly like working a cash register at Solsticetime, if Winter Solstice was an eternal event?_

_Still, the sight of the massive direwolf seated across the subway aisle lifted her spirits. The wolf was a sweet old thing, and for some reason, he was dressed like someone’s lumberjack uncle. Tilting his massive head to and fro, the beastie surveyed his fellow passengers with ridiculous solemnity…from where he was seated awkwardly on his owner’s lap._

_The creature was almost the size of the man who cradled it, so large he obscured the face of his master. Not that Alayne cared - if she had it her way, she would spend her days talking to people’s pets, rather than their owners. Pets were a lot less likely to be total morons who decided arbitrarily to change roadmaps on her, six months into a stupidly complex project._

_Just as she was about to tell the wolf what a good beastie he was, never mind that people were going to think she was crazy, the direwolf shifted, just enough so that her eyes met his owner’s own._

_“Uh…” she heard herself say, as the man stared at her in equal surprise._

_Thinking fast, Alayne grabbed her belongings and scrambled to her feet. Thankfully, the next stop was being announced, and while it was nowhere near her actual destination, there was no chance in hell she was staying on the train for another second longer than was necessary._

_Sprinting out the door, she was almost at the foot of the escalator that would have taken her to street level when an unmistakable voice called out behind her. In her head, she had been praying that she’d made a mistake - that the man she just shared a moment with was not who she thought it was._

_“Alayne, wait!”_

_Without quite meaning to, her steps slowed. Around her ankles the beast she had been ogling only minutes ago sniffed carefully, before sitting himself down. Lifting it’s massive head, he stared mournfully at her._

_“Why do you have to have such a cute animal?” Alayne sighed in defeat. Realizing she had already lost the battle, the woman crouched down and stroked the wolf’s head, paying particular attention to its furry ears. “You’re a good boy aren’t you? My god but you’re handsome, how does anyone resist those eyes of yours? Hmm?”_

_“Alayne come on.” she could hear the plea in his voice now. Blue eyes met dark brown, as the man she had been running from sank into a crouch._

_“Hello Jon.” Alayne said, withdrawing her attention from the direwolf, though it had been relishing her affections with massive enthusiasm. “How have you been?”_

_“Four years of nothing and that’s how we’re gonna start?” Jon practically exploded, exactly like the child she knew him to be. Some things never changed._

_“Well if you’re going to be difficult about it…” Alayne rose quickly to her feet._

_“Wait, fuck. Sorry. I fucked that up.” the man said hurriedly, reaching out and grabbing her hand in an effort to stop her from leaving. Not seeming to notice that she had frozen completely under his touch, he continued. “Please. One drink. One coffee - hell, I’ll buy you all the beverages if you don’t run off.”_

_“I…” she turned and met his gaze again. Swallowing, she remembered now, how she could never say no to him, and it always had to do with those goddam soulful eyes._

_“Please.” he was smiling a little now, obviously sensing that he was nearing some sort of success._

_Smug bastard._

_“Fine.” Sometimes, she really hated her penchant for self-torture. “One coffee.”_

_Ten minutes later, they sat across from each other in prickling silence. Though the coffee shop was warm and somewhat cosy, already, her mug was growing cold to the touch. Winter had a way of seeping into everything, no matter the technological advancements of the age._

_Alayne did not know why she had just ordered an actual coffee - it was past six o’clock in the evening, and drinking it would guarantee she would spend the whole night in restless purgatory, stuck between wakefulness and fatigue. In turn, by her side, Harrold would not be able to get any sleep of his own, and husband and wife would rouse themselves in the morning, ready to tear each other’s head off._

_Another fight was exactly what their marriage did not need, and certainly, it was not what she wanted in the least._

_Across the small table, in strangely familiar symmetry, Jon had yet to touch his congealing hot chocolate. When the man had first requested it of the barista, she had found herself taken aback. There was a time when sweet things were on his list of ‘food most evil’, and the beverage he was currently stirring was basically liquid sugar._

_Gleefully, she had considered that Jon had finally decided to join the side of the humans, and it was almost a little disappointing to realize that it was likely he had not._

_“Right…” he pursed his lips. “…not touching the coffee. That’s five dollars well spent…still have insomnia huh?”_

_“It comes and goes.” she pushed the coffee away at last, giving up all pretences that she might try taking even a sip of the burned brew._

_“Yeah. You used to talk about it all the time.” he chuckled rustily._

_“Like I could get a word in edgewise every time you talked about some new bicycle you wanted…” she retorted amicably, forgetting for a moment she wasn’t supposed to feel this at ease around Jon. Never again._

_“Please. At least I had interests outside of, I dunno, some new movie starring Daniel Craig.” he smirked._

_The two smiled at each other, and for a moment, it was as if no time had passed at all between them._

_“This wasn’t how I imagined it.” he said at last. “For the past four years, in my head, I must have thought of hundreds of things I would say to you the next time I saw you.”_

_With that, the illusion was shattered. Alayne fought not to show any emotion at his words - it hadn’t occurred to her that he might have thought of her at all._

_Jon leaned back in his chair. “You left. You just…fucking disappeared.”_

_“I had to.”_

_“Why?” he demanded, his voice growing harsher with every syllable. “I don’t understand. Help me understand. We were friends, we were great friends, and then one day, you just dropped off the face of the earth. I tried messaging you after you resigned, but you changed your number. You wouldn’t answer my emails, I couldn’t find you on Facebook anymore…I thought maybe you fucking died!”_

_“Ugh.” Alayne rubbed her eyes in frustration. It wasn’t fair for her to be angry at him, and yet… “You do know. How could you not know why I did it?”_

_“I don’t, seriously, I…”_

_“I told you I was in love with you.” the words poured out in a rush. “I told you I was in love with you, and I was, in fact, head over heels in love with you. Do you remember what you said next?”_

_Paling rapidly, Jon stared aghast at her. Opening and closing his mouth like a guppy, he seemed incapable of finding a response._

_“Yeah. Exactly. That’s what you said.” she slammed an open palm down on the table. “You said nothing.”_

_“You took off because what, I didn’t immediately fall into your arms?” Jon lowered his voice into an irritated hiss as he slouched towards her. “Are you seriously telling me our friendship was not worth it, not enough for you to at least drop me a line to let me know you’re still alive? Do you know what you put me through?”_

_“I fucked up. I get it…” Alayne bit her lip and looked down. “I realized about a year after, that I was being totally immature about the whole thing. But…do you know how fucking hard it was for me? I had to see you every day. I had to keep on behaving like nothing had changed between us...meanwhile, the entire time, I had to live with the fact that you didn't feel the same way about me even a little bit. Let me break it down for you Jon - it fucking sucked!”_

_“I swear to god Alayne, you can be such an idiot.” he ran a tired hand through his dark hair. “Fuck I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but you do remember I had just broken up with Ygritte back then right? A few weeks before you told me you were in love with me?”_

_“Um…”_

_Jon squeezed his eyes shut for a moment. “I was so fucking lost, and here’s my stupid friend, trying to get some sort of reaction out of me.”_

_As the man collected his thoughts, she stared at him in growing horror. From his perspective, she thought, she must have come off like such an entitled jerk._

_“It wasn’t like I didn’t think about…ah fuck. Alayne, I’m pretty sure I was in love with you back then, maybe not the same way you were with me. But like hell I was going to risk a relationship with you, until I knew for sure my head was screwed on right…I didn’t want you to be some rebound fuck and goddamn it, do I need to keep on talking?”_

_The two former colleagues stared at each other in stricken silence. Three years they had worked side by side; three years spent becoming as close as two people could become, without engaging in any form of romantic liaisons. They had fought the same battles, endured the same challenges…_

_“You are very much not the victim in this tragedy.” he laughed. It wasn’t a good laugh. “But because I’m a loser, who doesn’t know when to walk away from people I care about, even when they can be horrible human beings, right now, all I want to know is how the last four years have been for you.”_

_Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Alayne fiddled with a sugar packet. “I’m good. Everything is good. I got married back in 2011…”_

_“I see that,” he nodded towards her ring before holding up his own right hand, where a gold band glinted. “Me too. Earlier this year.”_

_“Huh. Guess things worked out for both of us then.” Alayne tried to sound hopeful._

_“Who’s the lucky guy?” Jon asked, looking down._

_“You know him. Or at least you’ve met him. I married Harrold.”_

_“Harrold. Yeah I remember…he’s…uh…” her companion seemed to have having trouble finding the right adjective._

_“You didn’t like him.” Alayne supplied helpfully. “You never liked anyone I dated though.”_

_“Can’t even begin to imagine why that might be,” Jon’s lips twitched upwards in a wry smile._

_“Alright fine. I’m a huge asshole and I’m really sorry.” she said with sincere contrition. “I behaved abominably, and in no way, like a good friend should have behaved.”_

_“Say it. Say you suck.” his grin widened. “Say you’re a terrible human being.”_

_“I suck.” she rolled her eyes, though there was something like relief blooming in her chest at the sight of his smile. “I’m a terrible human being.”_

_“Now say I’m better looking than Daniel Craig.”_

_“I see you’ve lost all touch with reality in the past four years,”_

_In response, he made a face at her._

_“I missed this. I missed you. Fuck the part about being in love with you. That’s over…I missed my friend.” he shrugged, and looked a little hesitant. “At least I hope you would like to be my friend again. You’re not just going to…vanish again are you?”_

_Every instinct in Alayne’s body told her that vanishing was likely the best course of action she should take. It was far too risky…already, her heart was beginning to take on a familiar rhythm, the longer she sat in the coffee shop across from Jon._

_“No.” she shook her head. “I’m not going to.”_

_“Does this mean you might even add me back as a friend on Facebook?” he questioned teasingly, though the uncertain trepidation in his voice was unmistakable._

_“I dunno, that’s a toughie,” she stuck her tongue out at him. Looking out the window, she caught sight once again of Jon’s wolf, which was looking hopefully towards his human from where he had been tethered. “Back on the subway, why didn’t you just put your direwolf on the ground? Why were you carrying that gorgeous hunk of sweet canine on your lap?”_

_“We just came from the vet. He seemed so sad…” Jon started sheepishly._

_“Yeah well, you made a giant spectacle of yourself,” she laughed at him._

_“Got your attention didn’t I?” he offered. “Should have known all I needed to do all these years, was drag Ghost all around town. You could never resist puppy eyes.”_

_“No.” Alayne agreed, wishing she could have defied his expectations somehow. “I really can’t resist.”_

_They were both reasonable, older adults now, Alayne decided. What could go wrong, being friends with each other?_


	2. Chase The Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Same as before. Go ahead and be brutal.

Jaime had two weeks to enjoy his unemployment, which he largely spent riding his brand new road bike. It wasn’t a yacht, but in his frank opinion, it should have come with some sort of cocktail bar attached to its handlebars, considering how much he paid for it.

While he necessarily spent time in the gym keeping himself fit and looking halfway decent, it had been a long time since he’d actually ridden a bike that wasn’t crowded into a spinning studio.

Pedalling experimentally down a bike path, Jaime was pleased to find that the cliches were all true - one simply did not forget how to ride a bicycle. For the first little while, he felt like a kid again as he sped around curves and corners.

That was pretty much where the familiar, fuzzy feelings ended though.

What he hadn’t counted on was how hard it was to get a stupid single speed bicycle up a hill. After the first week, one spent cycling every single day for fifteen miles at a time, the actor was convinced his legs were going to fall off, or at least, look completely monstrous compared to the rest of him. Everything ached and hurt, but still, he kept on pushing himself.

It was only when he stepped into the studio for the first day of filming, that his body finally decided it would start to forgive him. For one thing, he could now walk without wanting to die. Rubbing at his new beard, which was growing faster than he expected, before Jaime could get a word out, someone who recognized him on sight whisked the actor towards makeup.

Obediently, the man kept himself still as the make up artist worked on him, though his eyes lit up with interest as two figures approached. One of them in particular, caught his attention. Long, red hair fell out of a messy bun, while inquisitive blue eyes took in her surroundings with deep interest.

“…and here’s the star of your story…” the Production Assistant flanking the woman said, looking as if she simply wanted the tour to be over.

Giving his make up artist an apologetic look, Jaime pushed himself out of his seat and turned to greet Sansa Stark properly. That is, the woman behind The Friendship Agreement, and who had written the character he was here to film.

“Hi,” he waved shortly at her.

“Oh. Hi. Oh right you’re the star, that would make you…” she said brightly reaching out to shake his hand.

Staring at her dazzling smile, the first thing that popped into his head was this: her smile was the stuff upon which daydreams were made of.

Unfurling his tongue, Jaime took her proffered hand. “I’m Jaime Lannister. You’re Sansa Stark…I think?”

“Nicely deduced.” she laughed.

The woman seemed utterly at ease, which surprised him. For whatever reason, Jaime had been spending time in his head, constructing for himself an idea of who the writer was, and what she was like. Photos of her that had been posted on her publisher’s website were all blurry thumbnails, none of which did her proper justice. He had imagined someone older, someone more reserved and far more timid.

“Sherlock’s my middle name.” he replied, in hopes that she would think of him as witty and urbane, rather than awkward and lame.

“Unfortunate. I would have preferred John myself.” she replied cheerfully. “I always did like the sidekicks better.”

The Production Assistant cleared her throat pointedly, looking faintly put-out. “Ms. Stark was leaving…she had simply come by to meet the Director…”

“You could stay, watch me butcher Jon’s part a bit,” he offered hastily.

Something dimmed in her eyes. Sansa’s smile became a little less sincere, a little more forced. Feeling oddly guilty as he studied her reaction, he nonetheless felt a strange sense of satisfaction - the author, he thought, might have just confirmed a suspicion he had been nursing for sometime.

“I’m sure Ms. Stark has…”

“I have to get back to the office,” Sansa shook her head, ignoring the assistant. “I’m running up against five deadlines. This meeting was a great way for me to procrastinate.”

“You kept your day job?” he blurted out in surprise.

“Is he…” the woman looked at the Production Assistant, who stared back at her with what looked like contact embarrassment. Turning back to Jaime, she started laughing again, though she seemed heavily amused rather than offended. “How much money do you think I make _writing_?”

“I am not usually this bad at meeting other humans.” he could feel his cheeks burning.

“It was really nice meeting you Jaime,” she waved off his protestations. “Looking forwards to seeing the end product,”

“Can I buy you a drink sometime?” he blurted out, and added quickly, “Only because I have questions about Jon…’s character.”

Everyone around was staring at him like he had grown a second head. Suddenly, he very much missed working on the set of _Wyvern_. The crew generally treated Jaime like some sort of god there.

“Sure. Yeah. Just let me know when…” she shrugged, pushing her hair off her face. “Right now I actually really have to go though, so….”

“I’ll get you Ms. Stark’s cell number.” the Production Assistant looked as if her patience had been tested to its final limit. “Jaime, I’m really sorry but you really need to finish up and get moving.”

With a shrug, Sansa waved at him one final time, before she turned and walked away, leaving him staring after her in fascination.

***

They’d agreed to meet in a bar in the financial district, some place close to her work.

Arriving early, Jaime found himself surrounded by a ridiculous number of tipsy men, all of whom were shoved into designer suits. Every last one of them competed against each other with tales of recent conquests, both in the bedroom and the boardroom. Based on the details he managed to pick up above the crashing din, none of the men seemed capable of crafting a believable narrative.

Feeling strangely invisible in his hoodie and jeans, the actor studied the throngs of humanity about him and wondered how it produced someone like Sansa.

Jaime’s mistake was that he had read _The Friendship Agreement_ more than once. As far as books went, it wasn’t exactly a classic that fit in with the likes of Shakespeare, or Tolstoy, or hell, George R.R. Martin - though to be fair, it hadn’t been a _horrible_ read at the end of it.

Regardless of his opinion of it, from where he sat, the story read more like a record of conversations, a litany of confessions.

Two days ago, when he met Sansa, he couldn’t help but feel as if he was being reeled further into the unknown. In his mind, he had already been trying to get a handle on the person she was, based solely on the story she had written, and meeting her had only intensified his curiosity about the writer.

“Hey, aren’t you just sticking out like a sore thumb,” Sansa said, interrupting his thoughts as she plopped down in front of him.

“How? Why? What…” he patted self-consciously at his clothing.

“I mean, you’re here dressed like an engineer, in a sea full of douchebags dressed in Hugo Boss knockoffs.” she explained calmly. A few of their neighbouring drinkers gave her a dirty glare, glances of which she pointedly ignored.

“Wow. I thought I was the one in need of a filter,” he found himself starting to relax.

“I spend every day having a filter forced over my mouth. I have to be polite, all the time, because who knows what kind of incident I could trigger just by being honest. The moment I leave work, it’s like a switch flips off.” she admitted, signalling to a waiter.

The server came around and took her order. Turning to Jaime, the waiter was about to ask if he could get the actor anything else, only to stop mid-sentence for the sake of gawping at the older man.

“Holy…wow. This is so cool. Can I get a selfie with you please?” the server asked excitedly. Sansa had a look on her face, like she knew her order was now going to be delayed in getting to her.

“Sure, but if you could grab us a couple of drinks first, I’ll even tweet the photo later.” he smiled his most charming smile.

Jaime couldn’t help but feel like a hero as Sansa gave him a wide, grateful grin; it was enough to dispel the guilt in his chest that he had just used his fame for evil.

“You’re so cool.” she said, relaxing into her seat. “I guess he knows you from your show…uh…”

What was it Tyrion had told him?

_She’s a bit of a Wyvern fan - basically told her people she thinks you’re perfect for the role._

“It’s a show about hackers. I play the part of uh, an end user who keeps calling the wrong hotline for tech support.” Jaime said with a straight face. “This goes on for six years. Tons of hijinks and car chases. I make bombs out of hot water bottles.”

“Oh that’s…cool?” Sansa smiled uncertainly.

“Do you like my show?” he asked innocently.

“I don’t watch a lot of television. I mean, I do, but my tastes veer towards the trashy. There’s this show about fashion I’m really into…” she started apologetically.

“Funny, my agent told me you’re a huge fan of _Wyvern_ ,” he teased gently. “Apparently, you thought I was perfect for the role of Jon,”

“ _Wyvern_ is such a weird name for a show about hackers…”

“It’s not about hackers. I made it up.” his smirk had only grown. “So you’re not actually a crazy fangirl.”

“Sorry,” she pulled a face, only to brighten up as the waiter returned with her glass of wine. Obligingly, Jaime took the promised selfie, both on the server’s phone and his own. As the young man skipped away in glee, he took a sip of his replenished beer.

“To be honest, I made a passing comment to my agent about a poster she had in her office…you were in it. I told her you reminded me of somebody I used to know, and she asked who…” Sansa confessed before she took a sip of her Pinot Noir. “After that, I kinda just left her to do her thing.”

“Who did I remind you of?” he asked curiously.

“Doesn’t matter. Now that I’ve met you in person, I think I was just having an off day.” she shrugged. “You had questions about Jon’s character…do you wanna…”

“Oh, right.” Jaime nodded. “My question…is um. And you can lie to me, of course. But… _The Friendship Agreement_ isn’t fiction is it?”

Sansa took a long sip of her wine. And kept on sipping. The actor felt a little guilty, but he had to know.

“Why do you ask?” she put her half empty glass down after a few seconds.

“The way you wrote the story…it all felt too…painful,” Jaime explained earnestly.

“Ouch. The writing can’t be that bad,” she quipped, toying with the stem of her wine glass.

“That’s not what I…” he shook his head, realizing she was trying to derail his train of thought. “I mean, when I was reading it, the pain was like a real, tangible, living thing.”

The writer had stopped smiling. A small panicked voice in Jaime’s head kept on repeating _stupid, stupid, stupid_.

“I’m supposed to write what I know.” she sighed. “Or that’s what all the writing instructors say I should do,”

Deciding it was safer to keep quiet, he waited.

“Yeah its mostly true. Names have obviously been changed, the ending’s a bit forced…but…I’m basically the asshole of the story.” she said very matter-of-factly. Forcing a smile, she looked him square in the eye. “Hey could you be cool and spare another selfie, so I can get another drink? I accidentally finished this one.”

“It’s half…oh.” Jaime watched in admiration as she chugged the rest of her red wine. “Yeah sure, why not.”

 

***

_The Friendship Agreement (excerpt)_

_Snow and ice glittered on the sidewalks, under a brilliant blue sky. From where she sat, behind the relative safety of a glass wall separating her from the outside world, Alayne wondered what life would be like if she bought a one way ticket anywhere else at all._

_Across the street, her after-work appointment dashed through traffic to reach their meeting spot, dodging more than one angry driver as he did so. Hurrying towards the swinging doors, he heaved an audible sigh of relief as he stepped into the coffee shop._

_“My nose must be frostbitten to hell.” Jon said mournfully by way of greeting. Sliding into a chair across from Alayne, he rubbed his hands together in a futile attempt to warm himself up. “Tell me I’m still beautiful.”_

_“You’re beautiful as a…um…dewy rose on a spring morning,” Alayne improvised, lifting her cappuccino up to hide her smile._

_“Ergh,” he responded eloquently._

_“How’s your week been?” she asked._

_“It was great.” he grinned happily. "The ride for charity was a lot of fun - of course, the weather over in Qarth is a lot nicer than it is here right now. It's got me thinking about buying a better bicycle though.”_

_“Poor Dany,” she shook her head sadly. “To be bankrupted so young. You could put a downpayment on a house for one of those toys you like so much.”_

_“I’ll have you know my wife is extremely supportive of my interests; she rode alongside me, thank you very much,” he sniffed loftily. “How was your work trip to Pyke?”_

_“Awful. I had to go to Pyke.”_

_A shout of laughter bursting from his chest, Jon leaned back in his seat._

_“You wanna hang out here, or you wanna do something else?” he asked._

_Taking a careful sip from her cup, Alayne shook her head, not quite meeting his eyes. “I can’t be out too long. Harrold and I have dinner plans.”_

_“Going anywhere fancy?” Jon asked after a long moment, sounding as cheerful as he had been when he walked in._

_“He says its a surprise, which makes my life a little on the hard side. Do I wear a dress, or go with burlap?” she wondered aloud._

_“I’m pretty sure you’d rock either,”_

_There was something not quite definable in his eyes that made her gut clench painfully._

_“Hey, maybe we could have you and Dany over for a drink one of these weekends,” Alayne recited the lines she had been rehearsing for days. “Or head out for dinner one of these nights.”_

_“That sounds like a plan.” he agreed easily, and immediately changed the subject. “What are you up to on our birthday by the way?”_

_“Our birthday?” she scoffed, allowing herself to be diverted. “You mean my birthday,”_

_“Come now, we both agreed we would share the day. Like reasonable adults,” Jon reminded her, crossing his arms and resting them on the table. A beard was starting to come in over his jaw, forming a sort of patchy scruff all over his face._

_“It’s an accord I no longer agree to. Though since you’re asking, my husband and I are planning on spending a long weekend over in Braavos.” Alayne informed her companion. “We’ve already got our air tickets.”_

_“Dany and I are headed to Lannisport, but that’s also over the weekend. You and I, our birthday’s on a Tuesday this year.” his dark eyes were unwavering. “What are you doing Tuesday night?”_

_“Exciting plans. I was hoping to watch some Netflix with Harrold, maybe indulge in some birthday sex,”_

_“Solid plans. But I was gonna suggest we go play some air hockey after work, same as we used to do.” his tone remained unchanged. “That’s gotta be better than birthday sex.”_

_“You’re doing sex wrong,” she deadpanned._

_Ducking his head, his shoulders shook with laughter._

_“We could go Wednesday,” she said after a moment._

_“Ok.” he grinned. “Ok, yeah.”_

_***_

_On her birthday, as she prepared to go to lunch, Alayne’s phone buzzed._

_< Happy Birthday to us. Looking forward to kicking your ass tomorrow. Maybe pull out that burlap. >_

_Swallowing, Alayne slumped back down in her chair. Staring blankly at the screensaver of her monitor, she wondered seriously, what exactly it was she thought she was doing._

_When they had first began the arduous process of picking up the pieces of her friendship with Jon, Alayne had simply assumed that everything would work out fine. In no time at all, she thought, both her husband and his spouse would be spending time together on the weekends, maybe getting to know each other in the current iteration of their lives._

_Back when she had gotten herself into a mess by falling for her co-worker, Alayne and Jon were always very careful not to mention the names of their significant others around each other. In hindsight, it was a telling symptom of a rot that lay between them, but back then, it seemed natural that they would omit such significant details of their lives from each other._

_After a while however, the very denial of Ygritte's presence, or any one of Alayne’s string of boyfriends, started to fester their bond, enough that she had started to think of it like a cancer._

_Here, now, with the two of them freely discussing their spouses to each other openly and without reticence, she had expected the cancer to be in remission. She had expected things to be easy and uncomplicated...so why did it feel like something was still amiss?_

_Her phone buzzed again._

_< Dany says Happy Birthday. >_

_Reading and re-reading those words, Alayne felt stupid at first, though relief soon coursed through her veins. Standing and up gathering her purse to her, she decided she was simply overthinking things._


	3. You reinvent and feel that quick

_"If I could open my mouth, wide enough for a marching band to march out, they would make your name sing, and bend through alleys and bounce off all the buildings", Marching Bands of Manhatten, Death Cab for Cutie_

***

The summer sun was unrelenting, but the park was packed to the brim, with not a spare inch left for anyone to sit, much less relax. 

Strolling down a busy trail, Jaime ignored the occasional stares passerbys threw in his direction, though Sansa cast him amused glances every single time it happened, as the two of them slowly picked their way through their verdant surroundings. 

The couple would have made better progress, if the writer didn’t insist on stopping to gawk at every dog that crossed their path. It didn’t help that every once in a while, she bent over and baby-talked to some canine or other. 

It would have been extremely embarrassing if he didn’t sort of think the whole situation was endearing as all hell. Plus, the little breaks were a welcome respite for his still-sore muscles.

“Is there anything better than a golden retriever with a stick in its mouth?” she cooed as yet another mutt ran by, chasing some branch. “Is there anything more joyful?”

“I dunno, have you ever held a million dragons worth of cash in your hands?” Jaime asked. “I bet that feels pretty good.”

“I assume you do that every other day, since you’re a fancy celebrity. What’s it like being famous?" she asked, scooping up another mouthful of frozen yogurt with her little plastic spoon. 

"I have no idea," Jaime admitted. “I'm the kind of famous that occurs when you star in six seasons of a show on Sy-Fy, which only certain types of fans are into. By the seven, you should read some of the fanfiction.”

“I might’ve read some,” Sansa admitted with a smirk that sent him blushing like a sixteen year old girl. She continued, "You know, if the show had been more like Firefly, I might have liked it more,”

"Yeah but you think every show should be like Firefly." he pointed out a little huffily, before grabbing her hand and stealing her next mouthful of soft serve.

“Hey! Bad!” she smacked him away playfully. “Firefly was an amazing show that was too far ahead of its time."

Actor and writer had been spending time together for a few weeks. While Jaime was hesitant to call their meetings dates - mainly because there hadn’t been any _real_ physical contact between them - there was definitely a hint of some sort of flirtation sparking between them.

Or at least he hoped fervently that the spark he sensed wasn’t all just a product of his over-active imagination.

"As I was saying, I'm the kind of famous that lands me a repeated invite to conventions around Westeros. If I'm not careful, that's all I'll ever be - a bullet point on a convention flyer.” he explained morosely. "Don't suppose you have any words of encouragement?"

"I'm a woman in finance. I was promoted to a Managerial role two years ago, and now I'm pretty sure that if I'm not careful, this is where my progress stops,” she stated.

"So...no encouragement. Ok then," he sighed theatrically.

“They weren’t lying about actors and their egos.” Sansa made a face. “Jaime, you've got cheekbones to die for, you're all...stupidly handsome, and those few _Wyvern_ episodes you made me watch..."

"I didn't make you," he whined, hiding the fact that he was insanely pleased at what he was hearing. That is, that Sansa was blatantly saying she found him attractive. "But please go on saying nice things about me."

“...those episodes you made me watch made you seem like a halfway decent actor." she gestured airily. "You're worrying too much. I mean, it's not like you're unemployed. You're literally working on a movie right now."

“A low-budget indie movie." he said darkly. 

"Based on something _I_ wrote,” she poked him with her index finger.

Feeling brave, he grabbed at her offending digit and refused to let go. After some fruitless tugging, Sansa looked up at him with a small scowl.

"I suppose you want it back," he said softly. 

Brow softening, Sansa seemed at a sudden loss for words. Swallowing, Jaime wondered what the woman would do if he leaned forward and brushed his lips against hers. It had been a long time since he'd been in a position where he kind of wanted to kiss a woman, or at least one who wasn't a co-star.

The fact was, the more time they spent together, the more time Jaime found himself drawn to the writer, though it was largely against his better instincts. If her little confessional novella was anything to go by, the author whose finger was still childishly clasped in his hand was not exactly the safest bet to become attached to.

But still, she was awfully pretty, and she was clever, and charming and...

Jaime released his hold abruptly. The two of them shuffled awkwardly for a moment. 

"I could eat food..." she murmured after a moment. 

Smiling in relief, he allowed her to lead the way out of the park, and into the avenues of the city. 

 

***

 

"Do you know what I missed?" the actress playing Alayne mused, looking off across the expanse of water before them. 

The lighting guy must have had sort some of vendetta against Jaime, the actor decided, trying to position himself in such a way where he wasn't squinting at his co-star.

"My cutting wit?" he asked, studying a pair of extras who whizzed past them on sleek racing bicycles. 

These days, when the man had a minute of free time, he was pushing himself to add more miles on his rides. Cycling was getting easier every day, and he was beginning to prefer exercising in the outdoors, over being cooped up in his personal gymnasium. Idly, he wondered if Sansa would want to join him one of these days…

"I missed that we used to write each other every day. I know this is stupid, but all our stupid emails back and forth really made my day go so much faster," Margaery Tyrell said. Her hair fell in nut-brown curls, and her eyes were a sweet hazel. 

"You might have spent your time doing actual work,” he shifted his gaze to his co-star. Jaime was trying so hard not to squint against the glare, he was sure his eyes were watering.

“That’s an idea," Margaery giggled winsomely.

She sounded nothing like Sansa, Jaime decided.

"Yeah I missed it too," he added as Jon. "You didn't know it, but I saved all your stuff into this folder on my desktop."

"I deleted all our messages to each other six months after I started seriously dating Harrold," 

Maybe he was just that good of an actor, but the casual way in which his co-star delivered those words lanced through Jaime's chest with surprising strength. Despite the fact that this wasn’t the first attempt at nailing this scene, for some reason, the effort continued to affect him oddly. 

This time, for a split second, the woman before him wavered; he wasn't looking at Margaery, but staring straight at Sansa as she flippantly explained how she discarded years of missives with a simple click of a button.

Someone yelled. “Let’s try another take. Jaime, could you please keep your eyes open?”

Jaime rapidly blinked away at the moisture that was gathering in his eyes, as he readied himself for the sixth attempt to get the scene right.

 

***

 

It was eleven at night when he finally made it over to where Sansa was.

The place she had picked was packed to bursting with Friday night party-goers looking to make the most of a the weekend, but still, he had no problem picking her out from amongst the crowd. The woman was seated at the bar, working diligently on her laptop; to her right, half a glass of red wine sat within easy reach. 

Sliding into the small space between herself and her neighbour, he placed a hand on the back of her chair, effectively laying claim on her attention.

“Hey you,” she said with a welcoming smile, turning away from her computer. “How was work?”

In answer, he reached for her wine glass and finished the remainder of her drink.

“Oh. That sort of day huh?” she asked with raised eyebrows as she put away her laptop. “I was drinking that, by the way.”

“It was an interesting day. Shot an interesting scene.” he said after a moment, looking down at the scratched wooden surface of the bar.

For all of a second, she looked as if she were going to ask him what scene it was he had just spent hours trying to get right. Instead, Sansa stood up and leaned over the counter to get the bartender’s attention.

Just because he was having a slightly depressing day, didn’t mean Jaime didn’t appreciate the sight of a woman’s ass sticking out. As the writer strained to get her order understood above the ruckus made by the other patrons, he tilted his head to the side to get a better view. Feeling a little like a pig, the man’s bad mood began to dissipate nonetheless. 

All too quickly, Sansa was seated once again, and shoving a bottle of beer at him.

“Here. You can have your own drink and leave mine alone,” she took a swig out of her own bottle. 

Obediently, he sucked down a mouthful of the bitter brew, all while staring at Sansa and wondering again if he ought to simply act on his instincts. 

“How was your Friday?” he asked.

“Good. Better now,” she nodded with a strange glint in her eyes. Unexpectedly, she leaned towards him and pressed her lips to his. Without thinking, raising his free hand, Jaime slid his fingers into her russet tresses and pressed her closer. 

When finally they drew apart, he murmured against her skin, “What was that for?”

“I thought…” she looked a little unsure of herself. “I thought that’s what we were driving towards…”

Head swimming as if he had just finished an entire magnum of champagne in under a minute, he found himself grinning like an idiot. 

“Yeah we were. I just wanted to make sure we’re on the same page,”

Dipping his head, he tugged her back in for another taste. The noises of the bar faded into nothing, as his world narrowed down to the woman in his arms. Tightening his hold, Sansa made a small noise at the back of her throat as a small, warm tongue darted out to greet him.

Devouring her slowly, Jaime found himself losing almost all concept of caution. Almost. There was a small, panicked voice in his mind questioning the wisdom of his decisions, but it was all too easy to ignore, in favour of enjoying how right everything felt just then.

 

***

 

_The Friendship Agreement (Excerpt)_

_Braavos, as always, stunned her. Clean lines, soaring cityscapes, lovely arches...even in the freezing cold, with her hand clasped tightly in Harrold's, Alayne fell in love with the city all over again. It was the first day of their mini-vacation; husband and wife had taken Friday and Monday off, to spend four days in the Free City._

 " _Do you ever wonder what it would be like to uproot our entire lives and I dunno, just switch cities?” Harrold asked._

_"Sure. All the time," Alayne laughed, kissing her husband on his nose._

_Sliding and slipping their way across the iced-over sidewalk, they stared at various restaurants, trying to work out what they wanted for lunch._

_"I mean, it's my birthday, so scotch should be considered a perfectly acceptable meal," she pointed out reasonably._

" _Your birthday is not the whole week," Harrold replied just as reasonably, though his grin belied his words. “We’ve had this discussion.”_

_Opening her mouth to protest, Alayne found herself overruled by the sound of her husband’s cell, as it rang insistently from somewhere within the depths of his coat. Fishing out the small device, the man took one look at the call display and answered the phone._

_Hoping the call wasn't going to eat into their afternoon plans, Alayne stuck her gloved hands inside her pockets and wandered into a nearby gift shop. Absently, Harrold trailed after her._

_As the man slowly became lost in the details of his impromptu phone meeting, the woman drifted lazily among the aisles of the store. Stopping in front of a rack filled with a seemingly random assortment of items, Alayne wondered why anyone would want a rubber dragon mask, before deciding very quickly that she didn’t actually want to know._

_Fishing out her own cell phone, several work related notifications greeted her, all of them awaiting her urgent feedback. Despite knowing that it was a slippery slope which could accidentally lead to her doing actual work while still on vacation, Alayne began skimming each message thoughtfully._

_Reaching the bottom of the list, she found a text sent to her a few hours before._

_< I hate Lannisport. So much.>_

_It was Jon, messaging her from half a world away…where he was vacationing with his own spouse. Sucking in a breath, she pressed a button and watched as her screen went black._

  _Work bugging you too?” Harrold asked as he strode up to her, pressing a kiss to her cheek._

_Irrationally, Alayne felt guilt surging in her chest like a tidal wave._

" _No. I mean, yes…” she blinked at the man in irritation, though most of it was directed at herself. It made no sense why she should feel so guilty, when it wasn’t as if she was doing anything wrong._

" _I’ve got bad news.” Harrold sighed. “Shit’s kinda exploded. I think I’m needed for a couple of hours…”_

_The text from Jon was forgotten, as were all her other work messages. The woman stared at her husband, trying to think of a way she could express her frustration without him losing his temper._

_“I swear, I won’t take more than two hours,” he assured her. “And then you’ll have me all to yourself.”_

_“Is there anything I can say that would change…” Alayne started._

_“I’m going to grab my laptop from the hotel and find some place quiet to work.” his attention was already focused back on his phone. “I’ll be quick, I promise”_

_“Fine.” she said shortly. Not that it mattered. Harrold was already hurrying away from her._

 

_***_

 

_For the next few hours, she heard nothing from Harrold, despite his assurances that his work would be finished quickly, and she would have her husband all to herself once again._

_Wandering alone through the Braavosi Museum of Art, Alayne stopped in front of Edward Hopper’s painting, the one with all the sad, lonely people seated in a largely emptied-out diner. Desperately trying not to relate to the alienated, illustrated figures, she pulled her phone out for the hundredth time, hoping that this time, she’d would find some sort of message from Harrold._

_Instead she found herself staring at a second text, sent all the way from Lannisport._

_< How’s Braavos?>_

_Biting her lip, Alayne hesitated. Slowly, her fingers drifted over her keyboard before she selected ‘send’._

_< Cold, beautiful…cold…sorry about Lannisport>_

_Two minutes later, her cell dinged softly under layers of wool._

_Alayne smiled._

 

***

A game of pool with Sansa, pre-make-out era was fun. While he was generally mediocre at art of pinging heavy balls into small pockets, the writer was so bad at the game, it made him feel like he was some sort of pool hall shark.

A game of pool with Sansa, post-make-out era however, was fun in a wholly different way. Suddenly, the man could think of at least fifty ways he could demonstrate to the woman, how best to line up a shot. All of them involved wrapping one arm around her, while simultaneously positioning his lips right by her ear.

The better to instruct her, he informed her on more than one occasion in the same evening.

“But I’m getting the feeling you’re not actually good at this game.” she said with a mischievous smile, attempting to slide out of his grasp so she could reach for her beer. 

Instead of allowing her fingers to wrap themselves around the bottle, Jaime yanked her back into the circle of his arms, before crashing his mouth against hers. 

Whatever was happening between himself and Sansa really wasn’t getting old. In fact he was rather looking forwards to whatever came next, if the innocuous kisses they’d been sharing were anything to go by.

“Get a room,” someone hollered. 

“The others take me, is that Jaime Lannister?” someone else exclaimed.

“Oh Seven Hells, it’s one of your fangirls. I’m going to get murdered,” Sansa said breathlessly, pulling away with a small laugh. 

“They can try,” Jaime growled, nipping at her lower lip, then added thoughtfully. “I could be one of those celebrities with a crazy stalker. It’ll do wonders for my image.”

With a long-suffering sigh, Sansa shoved him lightly, just enough so she could squirm away from him. “And thus upon the altar of your vanity, I perish,”

“Worse things to perish for,” he shrugged. 

It’d been a long time since he’d felt this cheerful about anything, he realized. The last time he’d been interested in a woman had been when he was with Cersei, and by the time that misadventure had begun to fizzle, he’d spent most of his time moping and miserable.

The woman, herself an actress, had been seduced by the notion of superstardom. Living in what she had thought of as his shadow, had only caused her to resent him. Watching her slowly slip from him had been harder than almost anything he had ever experienced.

This whole being somewhat happy thing felt odd. Scary even. But it was nice all the same.

“All this smiling is really freaking me out,” Tyrion told him only days ago, as the two men worked through a bottle of bourbon in front of his television. “What happened to depressed Jaime?”

“That guy’s still around,” the actor replied, pouring himself another drink. 

“Are you seeing someone?” Tyrion was slurring only very slightly. The agent had slammed back more than a few glasses of drink in two hours. 

“Maybe. Sort of.” Jaime shrugged.

“That’s nice,” Tyrion sighed. “Is she an actress?”

She might well be, the actor thought, but kept that thought to himself.

“No, just artistic as all fuck.” he admitted. 

“Are you going to tell me who it is?” Tyrion inquired.

“Not really,” the man was suddenly reminded of the fact Tyrion had all but told him he had a crush on Sansa, way back at the beginning of this whole debacle.

“Yeah so, you’ve been caught making out with a certain writer.” his friend all but crowed, shoving his cellphone in Jaime’s face. “By the way, I feel like I should say something about ‘dibs’.”

Jaime grabbed his friend’s iPhone, and found that the agent was not in fact, making things up. On the touchscreen was a photo of himself and Sansa, caught in what was definitely a full fledged kiss as they waited in line for a hotdog. Well, _he_ knew it was the writer anyway; her own features were largely obscured by her loosened hair. 

Scrolling through the tiny article that accompanied the image, he found himself vaguely annoyed that the blogger - the one who posted the photo - had misspelled his name. Jamie Lannister indeed.

“I was wondering why she blew me off,” Tyrion grumbled, reclaiming his phone and scrolling onto other, more interesting celebrity gossip. “I thought we had great chemistry when we met. She’s kinda of nerdy, I’m kind of nerdy, she’s attractive, I’m passably good looking despite the height thing…”

“Wait, what do you mean she’s blowing you off? Have you been messaging her or something?” Jaime’s eyes narrowed even as he tried to remember he shouldn’t punch the other man. Good agents were hard to find, and good friends even more so.

Tyrion snorted. “Relax. She said she’s not really interested in seeing anybody right now.”

On the other hand, those weren’t exactly words Jaime had been wanting to hear. 

That conversation lingered in his mind even as Sansa gave up all pretence of playing pool, in favour of allowing him to swallow all her protests.

“Say,” he muttered after a moment. “Don’t suppose you wanna come over and watch television for the rest of the night,” 

“Is that what the kids are calling it?” she asked, her voice taking on a husky timbre that sent his blood rushing straight south. 

“Whatever gets you in bed, really,” he shrugged, grasping at her hand. Dragging Sansa towards the exit, Jaime felt nothing so much like a teenager trying to get a girl somewhere private. 

Somehow, on the cab ride back to his penthouse, he managed not to rip her clothes off, a feat he was ridiculously proud of. Not to say that the two of them didn’t shamelessly make-out in the backseat of the taxi, never mind its griminess. He considered it quite an achievement in fact, that he managed to wait until his front door was closed, before he began the serious business of undressing his companion. 

Tugging at her tank top, he made quick work of tossing it somewhere over his shoulder, before he started tearing at her jeans. 

“Whatever happened to offering me a drink first, and then I dunno, some sort of romance?” Sansa laughed as he pulled the stiff denim past her hips. “Where’s the effort?”

Effort, he thought with adolescent glee. He was pretty good at effort.  

Slowing his movements down, Jaime cupped the nape of her neck, fingertips trailing against her soft skin as his lips found hers once again. Insistently, languidly, he ran his left land down the length of her side and over the small of her back, as he pulled her so she rested flush against him. Dipping downwards, he cupped the curve of her bottom, skimming at the scalloped edges of her cotton underwear. 

His right hand crept slowly towards the clasp of her bra. In one swift move, he had the piece of lingerie unclasped, and sliding off her slender shoulders. 

With that impediment removed, Jaime found it necessary move his mouth towards her breasts, so he could lavish his undivided attention on both. Suckling gently on one stiff nipple, and then the other, in seconds, Sansa’s breathing had fallen into an erratic rhythm, her own caresses had become a little more frantic. Her hands drifted under his shirt, running urgently over his overheated skin. 

“Am I working hard enough?” he murmured, his fingers teasing between her thighs and caressing her slick folds. 

“You should take off your pants,” she told him very seriously.

“Whatever you say,” he laughed and complied. 

By the time their clothes were completely shucked, they were still only in the vestibule of his penthouse, but it didn’t really matter. With her back pressed against the wall, Jaime managed to thrust his hard length into her welcoming warmth. 

As one, the two of them groaned. 

Brushing her hair away from her eyes, Jaime moved carefully in tandem with Sansa, one hand braced against the wall behind her. 

First times were never going to be perfect, he was aware of this. But the man desperately wanted her to like what he was doing. 

Perhaps it was ego, but likely, it was because in his head, he was competing against someone he had never even met, but whom he was getting to know in a strangely abstract fashion. It didn’t help that she had documented her liaisons with this other man with almost uncomfortable detail.

Driving into her, he studied her ever changing expressions with fascination, listening for every cry and every moan he pulled from her chest. His own wants getting the better of him, Jaime found himself incapable of slowing down after a while, especially when she was fully returning his ardour. 

“Jaime...oh gods Jaime...” she breathed against his skin.

He had no answer for her, other than to thrust himself deeper still.

As she came, the man felt a sense of lightheaded relief, one so strong it broke through the last of his resistance. With a groan, his own completion followed quickly after hers. 

Sliding clumsily onto the ground, they held on to each other, both of them trying to catch their breath.

“I feel like you mentioned the word ‘bed’…” she giggled after a moment, kissing his naked shoulder.

“Yeah. Sorry about that. We could head there now…” he stroked her downy cheek. 

“Ugh. Bed sounds so good, but I really should be getting home,” she grimaced. “I promised my boss I’d look over a report for him and send him my feedback in the morning,”

For a moment, he convinced himself she was joking. As she shifted away from him however, and as she began to pull on her clothing, the penny finally dropped. Feeling a little foolish, he stood up and started hunting for his own clothing, unsure of what exactly he was to do next. 

“Jaime…” she murmured, once his t-shirt was back on. “This was really, really…amazing.” 

She reached up and pressed her lips sweetly against his, exactly as she had done that very first time she’d kissed him.

“I am really looking forward to using your bedroom the next time.” she promised, looking up at him with wide, blue eyes that held no guile in them.

 _I really want you to stay_ , he wanted to tell her.

“Good,” he said instead, before pulling her back in for a real kiss, hoping he was getting his message through without having to speak it aloud.

 Two minutes later, standing alone in his foyer, Jaime couldn’t help but wonder what the hell just happened.

 


	4. Do the Rewind Yeah

_The Friendship Agreement (Excerpt)_

_Spring was still a distant dream, but it was a dream everyone shared._

_Alayne tried to focus on pleasant thoughts, consisting of warm weather, birdsong, and springtime blossoms, even as Doctor Luwin conducted his routine, uncomfortable check of her breasts._

_At first, she thought the frown creasing the man’s forehead was simply a product of her imagination. But when the usual session of finger pushing and poking began to stretch on, and as the Doctor’s frown became an outright scowl, the woman could not escape the tide of dread that rose up the back of her throat._

_His use of the words ‘lump’ and ‘something we need to be concerned about’ confirmed that she absolutely had reason to be anxious. Coupled with the mammography he had all but demanded she undergo in the next day or two, Alayne was certain she was due for a series of intense headaches over the next little while._

_The first thing she had done as she left the Doctor’s office was to text Harrold, though she wasn’t exactly sure what to tell him._

_< Doctor found a thing>, she typed on her phone. <He’s pretty worried.>_

_His response was quick, and frankly, logical, though his message in no way comforted her._

_< I’m sure it’s all fine. He’s just being careful. It’s his job.>_

_Ambling slowly towards the subway station, Alayne couldn’t help herself. She sent another message._

_Half a minute after, Jon sent his reply in two parts._

_< I want to see you.>_

_< Now.>_

_It didn’t even occur to her to say ‘no’._

 

_***_

_They arranged to meet in a bar adjacent to their usual spot. Alayne needed a drink, nevermind that it might have been ill advised, particularly if the lump the doctor found under her skin was anything to worry about. Seated in a small booth at the back of the establishment, the woman nursed at her tumbler of single malt, scrolling slowly through an opinion piece on the Night King._

_There was a surreal quality to the moment as she considered that a wintry apocalypse might arrive after she had already died from cancer, so really there was no reason for her to worry about some despot on the other side of the globe._

_Though, she supposed, there was always the chance she wasn’t actually sick, and this was all just a false alarm…which meant she might inadvertently have to deal with some sort of end-of-the-world situation._

_It was such an idiotic train of thought, Alayne almost giggled aloud. Except she didn’t want to be that crazy woman drinking alone on a Wednesday afternoon, in the middle of a grimy dive bar, laughing to herself._

_Someone sat down beside her, shifting close enough, there wasn’t room for a breath between the two of them._

_“What did he say, exactly?” Jon asked without preamble. There was a haggard look in his expression that stunned her. The man looked as if he had left work in a hurry, with his coat unbuttoned and his tie askew._

_“It’s not a big deal. He found a lump that wasn’t there six months ago, and it’s a lot bigger than it should be.” Alayne smiled weakly. “He also told me it’s not necessarily, you know…”_

_“What?” he demanded, reaching out and grasping her left hand in one fluid motion; their fingers interlaced under the sticky table. “Not necessarily what?”_

_“You know what.” She blinked at him._

_Something broke in his features just then. With his free hand, he reached out and cupped her cheek, before leaning in and kissing her full on the mouth._

_She had no idea what to do for the first few seconds, though the panic in her chest flamed like a forest fire. Under his insistent attentions however, Alayne found that she was not proof against his determined ministrations. As her lips parted under his, it was as if Jon was swallowing all the words she had never truly said to him, all the things she had kept in her heart the day she walked out of his life._

_The kiss lasted forever and no time at all. When at last they parted, Alayne came to a horrible understanding that nothing was ever going to be the same again._

_“We shouldn’t have done that,” She stated, picking up the remains of her drink. Her other hand was still caught in his firm and unrelenting grip._

_“I don’t care,” he said. “We both fucked up four years ago, and now you’re telling me I might actually, really lose you.”_

_“We’re married to other people who count on us and love us,” she hissed, before she swallowed the last of her scotch. “Or at least, I love Harrold."_

_“Where the hell is Harrold, and why isn’t he here?” he refused to look away. The Others take Jon and his intense stares, she thought; they were almost fifty percent the reason why she’d fallen for him all those years ago._

_“He’s being really rational about this whole thing to be honest. Which frankly, maybe I should be too.” she laughed mirthlessly, turning to look at her companion._

_“Fuck rationality.”_

_“I've been meaning to ask, when the hell did you start swearing so much?” she couldn’t be bothered to mask her irritation. “There was a time you behaved like a choirboy.”_

_“It was after you left. I had to find a way to express everything I felt - how does that feel, knowing you’re the reason for the man I am today?” He asked her, right before he crashed his mouth against hers once again._

_This time, she didn’t hesitate, choosing instead to follow him down the path they had started traversing upon years ago._

_***_

_They did it in the backseat of his car, because frankly, where else were they going to go?_

_Alayne had never had an affair before, not really, and had never given much thought as to what it meant when people cheated on their spouses. At least, not from a logistical point of view._

_Television had taught her that there were hotel rooms involved, possibly, or public bathrooms, but the thought of having sex in a public bathroom was just too repulsive. Since neither of them had planned on embarking on an affair that afternoon – or at least she hadn’t – the backseat of Jon’s Land Rover was the only option._

_The vehicle itself was parked underground, beneath a monolithic office building. At three in the afternoon, the place was deserted, and Alayne convinced herself it was unlikely they would get caught._

_She wanted their tryst to be bad. She had wanted it to be so awful, she’d hate herself for risking her entire life with Harrold for a round of bad sex._

_The whole thing started out awkwardly enough. Her coat was flung over the front console, and her boots were discarded haphazardly onto the rubber matted floor. Somehow, they managed to get her slacks off, though there were more than a few 'ows' to go around as elbows and heads got smacked by the odd angles of the backseat._

_There had been a moment when the both of them had looked at each other, a question in their eyes as they contemplated whether they ought to go through with it._

_Again however, it was Jon who pushed on ahead, something which just kept on surprising her._

_If she were being honest with herself, she had expected him to chicken out the moment they left the bar. Or perhaps, she only hoped that he would, because by the Seven, she sure as hell couldn't find the words to put a stop to any of this._

_Carefully, he shifted her body so that her knees straddled his narrow hips. With his hands flattened across her spine, he captured her lips in a searing kiss. In one quick thrust, the both of them crossed that final line from which there could have been no return._

_Alayne badly wanted to hate it, but the man beneath her seemed determined to achieve the opposite. Moving in careful, precise strokes, every one aimed to bring her closer to the edge, she could barely string a coherent thought together, though she was satisfied to see that he too, was falling further apart with every passing second. Unbuttoning her blouse, he pushed aside the cotton cups of her bra, before laving each of her breasts with careful attention._

_Leaning into his shoulder, the woman came with a muffled cry, and wondered how it was possible to loathe herself, even as the pleasure continued to throb through her._

_***_

He'd been meaning to actually vocalize the question. With words. 

Something like 'so are we boyfriend and girlfriend now' seemed woefully immature, but these days, that was the first thing that popped in his head every time he saw her. 

Nobody had informed Jaime that being an adult would be so difficult, or complicated, though really, it probably shouldn't have been. A part of him wondered if they could just let that conversation slide, because heck, they were spending tons of time together, and when no one was looking, having copious amounts of sex. Great sex. The kind of sex he used to think only existed in films and books. 

Surely all of that counted as relationship levelling points, or however real life worked outside of a video game…right?

All day, his phone buzzed with messages from her…the silliest of messages sometimes, thought they all made him smile.

<When were we having dinner again?> Sansa asked him one afternoon.

<Tomorrow> he had replied in-between takes. Not far away, his co-stars patiently subjected themselves to the same hair styling treatment he was receiving, though they all seemed to be submitting to it with far better grace. 

<Oh>

He hadn’t quite known how he was to respond to that, though his fingers had itched to issue an invitation. 

<I don’t have a lot in my fridge> she texted a few minutes after. <Not really sure what I’m going to eat tonight :( >

Jaime’s grin was wide as anything, as he sent the writer a badly spelled response. Already, it was a growing joke between the two that the actor had the spelling skills of a five year old. 

That day, it was Margaery who commented on his brilliant smile with a certain degree of alacrity, coupled with a wistful look in her eyes.

“Someone special?” she asked, as their shared stylist brushed her curls out carefully.

“You have no idea,” Jaime responded cheerfully, as his phone buzzed with Sansa’s answer.

<Are you sure? We have plans tomorrow, and we just saw each other yesterday…I can’t stay out late tonight if that helps. I don’t want you getting sick of me lol>

<Wouldn’t ask if I weren’t sure. Hope you’re not sick of me if anything> he typed back happily, though he added very hurriedly in a second text, <lol>

<Yay> she replied simply.

While she had yet to spend the night at his place (and they had yet to do the deed over in hers), Sansa was never really eager to walk away after each tryst. If anything, she seemed as if she wanted to stay, but something at the back of her mind prevented her from taking that final step. Clinging on to that knowledge, he took her reluctance to walk away as a promising sign. 

As far as Jaime was now concerned, his earlier misgivings on who she was and what she was like under her snark and her banter, were all mostly taking a backseat. Indeed, he was starting to think of her as a long term investment, albeit a slightly risky one.

Eventually, he figured out a strategy that didn't involve outright asking her what the status of their relationship was. 

They were lounging on his couch playing Diablo III (he played a Paladin, while she played a Mage), when he casually threw out, "Do you wanna grab dinner with Tyrion this weekend, maybe?"

"Tyrion?" she frowned, decimating an army of evil undead on his plasma screen by summoning a blizzard of ice. 

"You know, my agent...also, the guy who tried to ask you out before." he tried not to sound perturbed about that little factoid as he made his tiny character run around Sansa’s own in circles, all while excitedly waving a broadsword.

"Oh gods right. Wait, why do you want to have dinner with him?" she asked, wrinkling her nose.

"Because he's actually kinda my friend..." 

It was just as well she found out about the sad and honest state of his social life. Sure, he had the occasional convention to attend, the occasional industry party to show up at, the occasional actor's soiree he went to for the sake of networking...but those were all work related, more or less. 

There were a few old co-workers he didn’t necessarily hate spending time, but at the same time, he didn’t exactly feel as if he connected heavily with them.

"Can you really be friends with someone you pay?" she asked bluntly.

Irritated, he didn't say much else after that, though he did wonder...

"Dude, you don't pay me enough," Tyrion complained bluntly the next time he hinted that their friendship was a little shallow in nature, considering how they had become associated with each other in the first place. "You had an ok run on _Wyvern_ , but in case you haven't noticed, you haven't been fully paid for the movie yet. Which means I've been your friend for practically free for a while now."

That shut down the conversation regarding the nature of their friendship very quickly. After sulking for a couple of days, Tyrion bought Jaime a drink and that was that.

His next attempt was a little less Tyrion-oriented. 

"I have a premiere to attend, for a movie an old colleague of mine starred in," the both of them were devouring takeout at record speeds. The concert they were going to was starting in twenty minutes and they were still in her rented studio apartment. "Do you wanna come as my date? A bunch of people I know will be there,”

The place looked strangely bare, Jaime observed. The furniture, though nice and obviously expensive, seemed thrown together in a hurry. It was odd - this was not what he had expected from Sansa’s home.

"Sounds like fun," she replied non-committedly. "But I don't really have an evening dress."

"I could buy you one," he grinned hopefully. "After all, I am a semi-famous, practically well-to-do celebrity-esque individual,"

"Ooh. Famous sugar daddy." she smirked. “Would you like me to call you "daddy"?"

Head spinning with possibilities, Jaime completely forgot how that conversation even came about. The man was do distracted, he barely noticed the way Sansa’s eyes darted back and forth anxiously as they left the building lobby.

The two didn't make it to the end of the band's set, before they were stumbling back to his place, necking like teenagers. Later, falling backwards into his soft pillows, Jaime was pleased that they even made it to his bedroom without mauling each other to pieces on the stairs. He was less pleased when she kissed him goodnight ten minutes later, before she made hurriedly for the front door.

***

Margaery and Jaime lay in a bed, with white hotel sheets artfully arranged about them. The buzz of cameras filled the air, as more than a dozen eyes stared at the half naked duo in the middle of the set.

“I tried messaging you,” he said. “We’d already stopped speaking for a while, and I couldn’t pretend like you were just some old co-worker who dropped away. You weren’t answering any of my emails…”

Margaery traced patterns on his naked chest in a way Sansa had never done.

“For about half a day, I thought you were fucking with me,” Jaime looked off into the distance, barely seeing the crew. 

He didn’t know when this role had become a weird sort of torture, only that it had.

“I wrote, and I wrote, and the person I thought was you kept trying to tell me I wasn’t talking to you at all.” he continued. “Maybe I didn’t want to believe it.”

To his right, Margaery, or Alayne, or Sansa - in his mind, the lines were becoming dangerously blurred - she had stopped moving.

“It took me some time, way too long of a time actually, to stop texting that phone number. Whomever I was trying to talk to, he just didn’t write back anymore after a while.” Jaime couldn’t keep the note of loss from his own voice. “I might as well have been throwing my words down a dark, bottomless well, for all the good it did.”

“I made a mistake.” Sansa’s words in Margaery’s voice told him. The actress delivered her lines in a soft, contrite manner which somehow, just didn’t suit the character. “I’m sorry. I made a huge mistake.”

“It’s fine. We’re here now. It’s all worked out,” he turned to Margaery, who wasn’t smiling. Lifting his hand, he stroked the side of her body possessively, exactly the way he had touched Sansa less than twenty-four hours ago. “It’s all worked out.”

 

***

“Can’t you stay the night?” he blurted out as he watched Sansa nosing around the room, looking for her underwear. There was a silent _‘please’_ at the end of that sentence and he prayed she heard it even if he didn’t say it.

Holding his breath, Jaime waited for an answer. 

Sansa glanced over her shoulder at him, pushing her mussed hair back behind her ear. Shrugging, she flopped back in bed, and warned, “I snore,”

“I don’t care,” his voice was a little shaky, albeit firm. “And if you don’t mind, I’d like to make you breakfast in the morning.”

“Sex and breakfast?” she raised her brows at him as she snuggled under the covers, tucking herself under the crook of his welcoming arm. “Is it my birthday?”

“No. It’s mine. Tomorrow.”  he smiled a little. Gawping up at him, she looked a little horrified. 

“Why didn’t you say anything? I didn’t buy you a present, and…”

“Blow me in the morning, we’ll call it even,” he laughed. Waking up next to her was going to be the best gift he could have gotten, but he didn’t say it aloud.

“Phew,” she shook her head. “Good thing you’re easy to please,”

Pressing a button on his phone, all the lights in his home powered down, and for the first time in weeks, Jaime felt at peace as Sansa settled by his side.

“Hey...” She said really softly after a moment, propping herself up on an elbow to look down at him. In the dark room, lit only by the lights of the city below, Sansa reached out and stroked his forehead, causing Jaime’s breath to catch in his throat. There was something so painfully sincere in her eyes, it made him start to want things he hadn’t even began to truly imagine. 

“I’m a writer but I’m really bad with the speaking of words...these few months with you have been so...what I’m trying to say is...”

It was clear she was struggling to say something important to him. And as much as he wanted to hear something, anything from Sansa that indicated she was as crazy for him as he was for her, Jaime couldn’t bear to watch her struggle.

Rolling his body so she landed under him, the man kissed her words away, hoping he was getting the steps right, to this complicated dance they were engaged in.

 


	5. Your Own Personal Jesus

_The Friendship Agreement (excerpt)_

_It had never occurred to the woman that having an extra-marital affair could be so easy._

_In the aftermath of that first episode of infidelity, Alayne had assumed she would burst into tears at the sight of her husband the moment he walked in through the front door. Instead, she found herself calmly putting the finishing touches to dinner, before husband and wife settled down and talked about her Doctor’s prognosis with little to no drama._

_What kind of person did that make her, she wondered. What kind of person cheated on her husband with such little difficulty?_

_A part of her wondered if the thing with Jon had been a one time thing. A part of her wondered what it would be like, if he became so filled with guilt, they would go back to a state of cold silence…_

_That latter thought filled her with a strange sort of grief, but at the same time, she could not deny that a part of her hoped for just such a scenario._

_It was to her guilty relief when the man started messaging her all over again within a span of a day. He spoke about nothing and everything, as if they hadn’t just both betrayed their respective spouses, and in turn, she responded to him, same as she had almost always done._

_Over the subsequent days, she lived in the delusion that he had gotten over whatever madness had overtaken the both of them in the backseat of his car. There was a chance, she told herself, that they could return to their old, friendly state, and never speak again of what exactly they had done._

_The fantasy was so powerful, Alayne decided that it was a good thing they got sex out of the equation, and now, they could just be proper friends. Buddies. Pals. Now that they had explored something they had both obviously thought about in the past, they could fully devote themselves to their respective marriages, without fear of what could have been._

_Then, exactly a week after they’d fucked in his car, he sent her a message…summoning her to the lobby of some hotel on the east end, far from where either of them lived. For a moment, she had considered typing a simple ‘No’, or even, not responding at all._

_Jon must have figured out she was a flight risk yet again, and had actually dialled her number in the middle of a Wednesday afternoon, after she spent a half hour obsessing over his text in panicked silence._

_“It’s a bit of a non-refundable situation,” his voice was warm and affectionate and everything she shouldn’t find appealing._

_“That’s just so hot.” she flailed in disbelief on her end. “Unlike ‘refundable’, a term that makes me go ‘meh’,”_

_“Alayne…” he started and trailed off; already, his surety in his efforts was faltering._

_“I’ll see you at seven.” she said after a moment. There was no iteration of Alayne that liked letting the man down._

_“Ok,” Jon sounded relieved. Already, in her head, she was drafting an excuse to Harrold explaining why she wasn’t going to be home on time. It took her a little while to remember that her husband had left that very same morning on a business trip to Dorne, and more than likely, she would not receive so much as a word from him over the next three days._

_The biopsy she had taken only a day ago still stung, and Harrold had made soothing noises at her the night before, as they went to bed._

_“They’ll find it’s nothing, you’ll see,” he told her, fingers grazing lightly over her taped off flesh, eliciting a hiss of pain from between her teeth as he did so._

_She vaguely remembered herself telling those exact words to her mother once. It wasn’t a memory she liked. In hindsight, Alayne knew she had been lying to the other woman, though perhaps it had been a lie borne of selfish hope._

_“Maybe,” Alayne said. “Likely I suppose.”_

_“There’s the sane woman I married,” Harrold mumbled before yawning widely. All too quickly, he fell asleep, leaving her staring off into the consuming darkness._

_That was Tuesday night. On Wednesday, arriving at the hotel slightly earlier than she intended, Alayne looked about the lobby, wondering if everyone present was somehow magically aware of the reason she was there to begin with. Before she could turn and make a run for it, strong arms wrapped themselves around her waist, and a familiar set of lips launched a gentle attack on her neck._

_“Rick, honey, I thought we agreed no public displays,” she quipped automatically._

_“You better be kidding me,” Jon growled possessively in her ear._

_“And if I’m not? Maybe I’m waiting here for a tall, handsome hero named Rick.” she babbled as his breath ghosted against her skin. “Maybe I’m waiting for an evil genius with a secret lab, who travels through time and space with a devil-may-care attitude.”_

_“Somehow, I don’t think so,” he murmured, and paused. “Do you have some sort of thing for Rick Sanchez I should know about?”_

_“Who? What? Jon…I’m hungry,” she protested weakly as he grabbed her hand and led her towards the elevator landing._

_“So am I,” he smiled wolfishly. Ushering her into a waiting car, he selected a floor somewhere high up in the double digits. As the doors slid shut, leveraging his entire frame, he pressed her up against the walls of the enclosed space, trapping her in the circle of his arms._

_“It’s only been a week,” he murmured. “And I’ve been going crazy wanting to see you again…”_

_“Jon we need to be sane about…” she wasn’t allowed to finish. His mouth slammed demandingly against her own, even as he nudged a hard thigh between her legs, coaxing her limbs apart._

_“Don’t wanna be sane…” he declared as he pulled away, unbuttoning her coat with one hand and slipping the other under the thick wool. Long fingers wrapped themselves in a bruising grip at her hip. “Spent too long being sane.”_

_“Can’t we talk about this at least?” she asked breathlessly as he drew kisses all along her jawline. All too easily, he had her fly undone. With little ceremony, Jon slipped his right hand into her jeans. Pushing aside the thin material of her panties, he stroked urgently at her burning core._

_“You’re so fucking wet…” he chuckled against her clavicle. “And all of it is for me.”_

_Heavy metal doors opened. Pulling her coat shut, he led her out with fingers still damp from where he had touched her. Down the endless hallway, her heart pounded like it was going to burst out of her chest. Eventually, he stopped and fumbled in his pockets before producing a keycard._

_Practically shoving the door open, Jon placed a firm hand on the small of her back and gently pushed her over the threshold._

_Quick to follow, the door hadn’t even swung shut before he was on her once again, pulling and stripping at the layers that obscured her body from his dark eyes._

_Dropping to his knees, all while giving her an infuriating smirk, he leaned forwards and licked at her clit, which literally caused her knees to buckle under her._

_Rational thought left the room as he inserted a finger, and then two inside of her, all the while tonguing insistently at her slick folds._

_“Christ, I’m going to…” she managed to gasp as she threaded her hands through his dark hair._

_Immediately, the man stopped his ministrations and pushed her backwards onto the bed. Yelping in surprise, she bounced very slightly. Alayne glared up at Jon, who only laughed at her frustration as he removed his own clothing with admirable speed._

_Climbing onto the bed, he crawled above her, looking nothing so much like a wolf about to pounce on its prey. Sliding one hand under her right hip, he angled her body carefully, and slid his hard length inside of her._

_Good intentions long forgotten, Alayne arched her back and keened, clutching at pristine sheets with both hands._

_“Fuck…” he gasped, rocking against her. “This is better than I remembered…”  
She could barely manage words. _

_“Come for me,” he moved with intention, thrusting into her with deliberate, almost calculated strokes. “Alayne…”_

_Hooking an arm around his neck, she drew him close and acquiesced. Jon followed swiftly, roaring his own completion._

_Slumping down beside her, the both of them stared at each other wide-eyed and panting._

_It took a few minutes before Alayne could grasp at the tatters of her sanity. When finally it returned, she pulled at the sheet underneath their bodies with every intention of hiding her nakedness. A firm hand grasped gently at her wrist before she could draw thin cotton over her breasts._

_“Did that hurt?” Jon asked, nodding towards where the lab techs had conducted the biopsy._

_“They took a giant hollow needle and stuck it in my flesh. Then they removed a bit of said flesh.” she stated with a small frown. “So really, it tickled.”_

_“You don’t have to be a smart ass about this.” he smiled, though uncertainty entered his eyes, replacing the cocky arrogance that had filled them only a minute ago._

_“I’m sorry…I just…” she shook her head._

_“Yeah. I guess…I guess this is um.” he stopped._

_“Weird? Awful? Wrong?” she threw out some adjectives, wondering which would stick._

_“I was going to go with ‘strange because its so new’.” he looked a little hurt. “I certainly don’t think its awful, and judging from your reaction just now, you didn’t think it was awful either,”_

_“I don’t…goddamit Jon, the sex was mindblowing.” she rolled her eyes. “You win at the Sex Games…”_

_“Awesome.”_

_“…but we just straight up flunked at marriage.” she dragged herself up to sitting._

_“Yeah I suppose we did.” he sighed, following suit. “I don’t know what to do. When I’m around you, I feel like we’re finally picking up the threads of an unfinished conversation from four years ago. When I make love to you, it’s like we’re finally connecting the way that we should always have been connecting.”_

_Alayne was silent for a moment, before she finally asked, “Does Dany know about me?”_

_“What? Of course she…”_

_“I mean, does she know I exist?” she demanded. “You know, as your friend, your old co-worker, whatever,”_

_His silence was all the answer she needed. Now, instead of never mentioning their spouses to each other, they simply omitted each other’s names from their spouses. So much for “Dany says happy birthday” - deep in her heart, she knew she had never quite believed that text he’d sent back in February._

_It was unfair of her to twist the knife, but she couldn’t stop herself. “Don’t you love your wife?”_

_“Yes, of course I do,” he said at once. The only reason why Alayne was hurt by that statement was because she felt like she had just betrayed someone she had never even met._

_“I love her, but it’s not quite the same. I thought I was happy, and then you came back into my life. Suddenly, it’s like a light’s been switched on.”_

_“If you love her, “ Alayne pressed on wretchedly. “We shouldn’t be doing this.”_

_“No, of course not,” he rubbed at his eyes. “But I don’t want to stop. In fact, I’m quite sure it’s the very last thing I want.”  
“We should be adults about this,” she made to climb off the bed, only for him to lunge over. Laying a hand over hers, he stopped her departure in one quick gesture._

_“Do you really want to stop?” he asked, looking at her beseechingly. “Say the word, and we’ll stop. I mean it. This will the last time we ever do this.”_

_“Do you ever think that this could end up in the both of us hating each other for ruining each others lives?” she asked, voicing her truest fear._

_“No.” he said simply. “Answer my question.”_

_Helplessly, she allowed herself to be drawn back into his embrace. She allowed him to kiss away all the words that kept on wanting to bubble to her lips._

_Before his hands began drifting further south once again, her stomach growled, interrupting the moment with its definitive protest._

_“Right…you did say you were hungry.” he smiled softly down at her. The fondness in his eyes was unmistakable. “We could order food…”_

_“Might as well,” she sighed. “Adultery and appetizers - they go together like cheese and crackers.”_

_He started a little in guilt, though he shook his head at her in mock indignation. “Not everything requires alliteration.”_

_In for a penny, in for a pound, Alayne decided with finality as she pressed a kiss to his cheek. “I have one condition.”_

_Jon raised his eyebrows._

_“Don’t ever call it ‘making love’. What are you, some forty-something housewife?” she offered him the tiniest and shakiest of smiles._

_The unfortunate truth was, Alayne didn’t want to associate any more emotions than she had to against what the two of them were engaging in. Her heart had been shattered once - crushed, in fact - in Jon’s hands. The thought of it happening all over again, of having to get over him again, made her physically ill._

_The remembrance of loving him, all the while knowing it was a hopeless, hopeless thing…it was a fate she wouldn’t wish on her worst enemy._

_Yet remember it she did. Alayne had loved Jon so much, it had literally hurt. She had loved his smile, his laugh, his jokes…she had loved how he could never do things by halves, how everything, every last thing had to be done exactly right, or not at all._

_She had waited for him, waited and waited. Alayne had once imagined that all Jon really needed was time, before he finally thought of her the way she thought of him._

_“Alright,” the man agreed in the present, dipping down and biting her earlobe. In a low voice, Jon added, “I have no problem fucking you into next week, if that’s what you prefer…”_

_Allowing her eyes to slide shut, Alayne forced herself to ignore her frantic heartbeat._

 

***

It had been years since Jaime had shared his bed with anyone, which meant that Sansa’s presence, though welcome, kept him from sleeping properly. 

Which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. 

They’d made love twice more in eight hours. Sansa seemed pleasantly surprised by his ardour, which only enforced his opinion that things weren’t as dire as he had imagined them to be. 

In fact, it was incredibly likely he had been overthinking. That conclusion was reached after their third act, when he had rolled over beside her and met what was unmistakably a happy smile on Sansa’s face. 

“You keep this up, I’m going to want to spend the night every single time,” she laughed, stroking his damp hair from his cheek. 

_Happy birthday indeed,_ he decided. 

One short nap later, Jaime found himself in the kitchen whistling cheerfully as he brewed a pot of coffee and flipped a few slices of bacon. The eggs had all been soundly beaten; close by the toast sat patiently, waiting their turn. 

“Mm. Handsome man making me food after a night of mind-blowing sex. How lucky am I?” Sansa asked as she materialized in the kitchen. 

“I dunno, you haven’t had the eggs yet,” he tilted his head over his shoulder to look at her with a half-smile.

The woman’s hair was a mess, and she was wearing one of his hoodies over the t-shirt he’d left on the floor the night before. As she stretched to nab herself a cup of coffee, he caught a glimpse of her underwear, and it was all he could do not to switch off the stove and march over to her side. 

In that moment, she looked so very much _his_. It sucked that he still wasn’t completely sure, he realized with a pang.

Pushing the ache away for the moment, determined to enjoy his birthday, Jaime turned his attention back to perfecting his first home-cooked breakfast with Sansa. 

They spent the morning existing in a state that felt like it came right out of a movie scene (coming from him, that was saying something). Snuggled together on his couch, they ate their breakfasts, and fought over the remote control, all while rubbing their bare feet against each other. 

When it was clear lounging was proving too boring even for him (and Jaime lounged a lot when he wasn’t working), they filled his tub and settled into its warm depths, carelessly displacing all sorts of water as they did so. Not that he cared. The whole world could have disappeared outside, and he would have been just fine with it.

“I don’t know why we don’t do this more,” she murmured, tilting her face upwards to kiss the underside of his scruffy chin; she was nestled snugly against his body under all the froth. 

_Because you never want to_ , he thought.

In all fairness though, he was never the type for bubble baths. He had only bought some fruity bath foaming thing a month ago when he imagined what it’d be like to take one with Sansa.

“I don’t know, but I’m certainly having fun,” he said aloud.

A soap slicked knee rose above the surface, unconsciously prompting Jaime to move his right hand past her belly, so it nestled between her thighs, upon her soft mound.

“Aren’t you tired?” she giggled throatily.

“Yes, but…” his fingers dipped languidly. “…this doesn’t really wear at me as badly as you might think…”

The man could feel her body tensing against his, thrumming like a taut instrument. 

“Is this good?” he whispered against her ear, watching as she began to lose herself under his deliberate touch.

“Jaime…” she murmured, seemingly trying to keep herself from wantonly pushing into his fingers. 

“It’s ok,” he soothed, grazing his other hand over her left nipple, relishing the way she gasped as he did so. 

“I thought you wanted…” she panted, tossing her head to and fro. 

“This is what I want. You.” 

Dipping his fingers in her silky, warm depths, he made sure to draw her pleasure out as long as he could, before he finally afforded her the satisfaction she obviously craved. 

Much later, as she prepared to spend her second night in a row with him, Jaime understood that he had a problem. 

He was falling in love with Sansa Stark, and the idea of not having her as a fixture in his life was fast becoming an untenable solution.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rick and Morty Reference!


	6. Through the Heat of the Sun

__

_The Friendship Agreement (Excerpt)_

_Her cancer scare came to nothing, as Harrold suspected it would. Not of course, that there was no fallout from it._

_Alayne didn't know what Jon told his wife when he disappeared on Wednesday evenings. Likewise, she never explained to him what it was she told Harrold. There was simply no point in explaining their separate falsehoods to each other. It was enough to know they were both betraying the people who loved and trusted them, and it served as the unspoken burden they both bore for the sake of being with each other._

_Things would have been so much easier, she thought, if Jon was just some random guy she met online, on one of those dating sites for cheaters._

_Instead, despite the ridiculously fantastic sex, she found that Jon was still very much the guy she liked talking to, and hanging out with. In short, she was fucking a very good friend, and gods help her, but she was having fun doing it._

_When they weren't fooling around in various hotel rooms, they continued doing what they did best - they constantly spoke on anything and everything that passed through their minds._

_Often, when they weren’t ardently devouring each other behind closed doors, the two of them would bicker playfully while strolling down unfamiliar neighbourhoods, down streets where they didn't know anyone. Not that the latter was a new habit - there had been a time when this was a ritual they often indulged in as day melted into night._

_Assured of their anonymity through years of habit, the two of them were caught off guard the day someone called their names, both their names, as they passed the entrance of a grocery store._

_Casting each other apprehensive glances, they turned as one to look at whomever it was that was loudly hailing them on a public street. In Alayne's mind, she had half a hundred excuses fired up and ready to go._

_"Guys! Holy crap!" it was Sam, a shared co-worker from their previous life. "How long has it been?"_

_"Five years, plus or minus," Alayne muttered._

_"How have you guys been?" Sam asked excitedly, balancing his burden of shopping bags. His eyes shifted down to their un-joined hands. Catching sight of their respective wedding bands, his smile widened. "Holy shit are you two married? You know, I always suspected..."_

_Before Alayne could clarify ‘Married to other people, yes,', her companion chose that moment to completely stun her into silence._

_"Yeah we did get married," Jon responded, and wrapped an arm around her shoulder, tucking her close against his side._

_To her credit, she must have kept her calm admirably well as Sam nodded without a hint of disbelief. "Hey maybe you guys would like to grab a drink with me and my old lady sometime. Like a double date.”_

_"Sounds like fun," Jon agreed cheerfully._

_"Speaking of, I gotta get back to Gilly. She’s got her hands full with the little one,” their old colleague said regretfully. "Drinks soon yeah?"_

_Waving at him, the two watched as he disappeared around the corner, before Alayne yanked herself almost violently away from Jon, who gave her a wide-eyed look of panic all his own._

_“What were you doing?" she hissed._

_"Uh. I thought it would be funny?" he sounded sheepish as he stuck his hands in his pockets "I can't remember why I thought that."_

_"Crazy is not a good look on you," she shook her head and started to walk away from him._

_“Hey, stop..." he caught up with her easily, laying a firm hand on her elbow. Looking up at him, she saw the very thing she'd been trying to pretend she hadn't been noticing. "I lied. I know why I did that. It was stupid, but the truth is, I think it's time we talked about what we're doing, and what comes next."_

_"Nothing comes next," she sighed. His hold tightened ever so slightly as he took in her words; his jaw worked under his scruffy beard. “Nothing except the inevitable end when we split ways and go back to pretending we don't know each other."_

_"You can't mean that." he said sharply. "Alayne, I think it's time we came clean with Dany and Harrold, don't you?"_

_"Again, I say, crazy is not a good look on you." she repeated stubbornly._

_"I'm not crazy." he lowered his voice and stepped in close. "I can't keep doing this. I hate knowing you go home to Harrold every time after we've been together. I hate the fact you share a bed with him, and that he even gets to touch you."_

_It wasn't as if she liked it any better that he went home to his wife, and spent the rest of his week with another woman when he wasn't at work. More than a few times, she had caught herself watching the clock, wondering if Jon had left the office yet, and if he was sitting down to dinner with Dany._

_Or worse, if they were engaged in something she very much didn't want to think about._

_The difference between herself and Jon however, was that Alayne had no illusions about the route the two of them were taking. It was slightly more scenic than the last path the both of them had trod, but it was obvious what their final destination was._

_"I love you.”_

_Three words and three syllables, crisp and clear, hanging in the air between them._

_“I'm in love with you, and I know you feel the same," he continued, refusing to release her. People were starting to stare. "I'm sick of pretending that's not what this is."_

_"Jon, this isn't the time or place..."_

_"Then when or where?" he asked in frustration as he pressed their foreheads together. "We can't exist in this state forever, but what it comes down to is this: I don't want this to end, and I don't want to lose you. I refuse to, in fact. Alayne, if you care about me at all, please tell me you feel the same."_

_The worst part, she thought much later, was that spark of hope that ignited in her chest as she listened far too closely to Jon's words._

***

It was only natural upon realizing he had gone and fallen for the woman, that Jaime should almost immediately try his utmost to wreck everything.

Only a little while after his ridiculously blissful weekend with Sansa and after a particularly frustrating few days on-set, the man decided at last that he would bite the proverbial bullet.

“I really, really think it’s time we tried having dinner with my friends. Or yours,” he said as they sat in the middle of a crowded restaurant. The place attracted any number of pretentious hipsters, who did their best to look like they didn’t care that they recognized him. 

The moment those words emerged from his mouth, it occurred to the actor that perhaps this conversation might have been better started when the two of them were alone. Rather than in a room full of strangers who knew who _he_ was, but none of whom he was acquainted with.

Jaime Lannister - architect of his own nightmares.

With a sigh, Sansa put down her fork. “Why’s it so important right now?”

“Because we’ve been seeing each other for three months and I’m starting to feel like some dirty little secret you’re keeping from everyone we know,” he said in a low voice. The can of worms had been opened, so there was nothing for it now, but to finish every last one.

“I thought you liked being my dirty...” She started to smirk ever so slightly.

“No. No don’t do that thing. You’re clever and I’ve been slow on the uptake...”

“Excuse me?” Her smile was gone, replaced by an expression that might have generously been described as ‘irritated’.

“I really...ergh...Sansa, I really want this thing here...” he gestured wildly between the both of them. “...to be serious. And I feel like you’re not taking me seriously at all. I’ve been trying so hard to be the perfect boyfriend, and I don’t know maybe it’s because you have a problem with men who are available, or men who want to commit to a life with you or something, but don’t you think...”

Very carefully, Sansa set down her wine glass and crossed her legs. Snapping his mouth shut, Jaime regretted his entire life. 

He wondered if this was how her underlings felt in that scary office she worked at, whenever they got in trouble.

“You think I have a problem with available men.” Her voice was flat. “Do you mean unmarried men? Or do you mean the men I’m actually married to? Do you mind expounding on this theory?”

“No. No really I...”

“Jaime, what are the names of my ex-husband, and the man I cheated on him with? And I mean their real names.” She asked calmly. “Not the names of the characters in the script you read from every day.”

“Uh.” He stared at her, stumped. All around them, the hipsters had all drawn back, as if aware there was some sort of implosion occurring at the next table.

“Yeah. That’s what I thought. Jaime, I really, really want to take you seriously, but you seem incapable of returning that basic courtesy...” she sighed, folding her napkin and replacing it on the dinner table. In a span of two minutes, she looked as if she had aged ten years. “The one I married. His name is Ramsay. The man I fucked around with - he’s called Aegon. And now there’s you to add to my list of dubious decisions.”

He knew it would look needy, and a little desperate, but Jaime suddenly feared where this conversation was going, and it was the exact opposite of what he wanted. Already, the disappointment in her eyes was too much to bear but he forced himself to meet her gaze regardless. 

Reaching out, he grasped at her hand.

“Sansa I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to...”

“It’s ok,” She said. “I’ll get the check. I think I’m a bit tired so I’m going to just head home and sleep if that’s alright.”

“Can I walk you home?” He asked, feeling for all the world like a boy about to get his heart kicked to shit. 

“I’m ok.” She shook her head and withdrew her hand from his. “This isn’t me blowing you off for good. Give me a few days ok? And we’ll see where we go from here.”

A few days. Gods. What did that mean? Two days? A week?

How had he lived so long, without ever installing that filter in his brain, Jaime wondered wretchedly as they stood up. 

***

_The Friendship Agreement (excerpt)_

_The pain started on a Tuesday afternoon. Hunching over at the sudden stabbing sensation in her abdomen, Alayne wondered if she was going to pass out. Something wet pooled between her legs, wet and red._

_A colleague looked over at her in concern. Eyes widening, frantic fingers dialled 911._

_***_

_It was a miscarriage, they explained to her a few hours later._

_Hadn't she known she was expecting?_

_When had she gotten her last period?_

_Should they call her husband?_

_"No." she said hoarsely, struggling to sit up._

_"Don't push yourself," the nurse clucked her tongue, trying to sound sympathetic and failing quite spectacularly. "You don't want us to call your husband?"_

_"No it's fine. I'll call him. I don't want him to worry," Alayne lied. More accurately, she didn’t want Harrold to hear the news of her botched pregnancy - it would be an awkward conversation to be sure, considering his vasectomy a few years ago. The one he underwent without talking it through with her first._

_It was Harrold’s ‘pre-emptive strike’ as he called it, against the possibility of children._

_The pill she’d been secretly taking everyday, evidently, had not guarded her against her indiscretions._

_"You're not going to be discharged tonight Ma'am...he's going to figure something's wrong when you don't go home." the nurse shook her head and left the room._

_It occurred to Alayne just then, that she didn't care if Harrold figured something was wrong. In fact, she had a numb moment of understanding that she never wanted him to be involved in anything in her life ever again._

_Reaching for her bag, Alayne dug around until she found her cell phone. For a moment, she considered calling Jon before she saw what time it was. The man would be home with Dany right about now…besides, what exactly would she tell him, she wondered._

_Flashing on the screen of her phone, there was a single message from Harrold demanding to know where she was. It wasn’t a message she felt like answering._

_Flopping back in bed, Alayne stared blankly into space, and understood with dreadful clarity that it wasn't just her unborn baby's life that had ended. A chapter had closed on her, and she hadn't even realized it, hadn’t even seen it coming._

_Eventually, the woman began to cry._

_***_

_She didn't see Jon the following day, coming up with a lame excuse about having a cold._

_"I don't care if you sniffle on me," he cajoled over the phone. "We could just watch bad hotel cable,"_

_"That sounds nice," she lied. The thought of seeing Jon just then sounded like her personal idea of hell. "But really, I just want to sleep this off if that’s alright.”_

_From the hospital, she went straight home with a very specific mission in mind. Catching sight of her husband's dark, furious eyes as she stepped past the threshold, she finally said the four words she'd been meaning to say for months, years even._

_Four words and five syllables, to put an end to something that should have been finished a long time ago. Words of which she had never been able to say aloud, for fear of what it meant for the rest of her life._

_***_

_There was no hiding the truth in the end. Two weeks of not seeing him, and Jon was getting more vocal by the day. There were only so many increasingly frantic voicemails she could take, that varied from pleading to scared to angry._

_It was enough that Ramsay wouldn't leave her alone, with his phone calls and text messages, his endless stream of emails. It was enough that he now practically haunted the lobby of her office building. Their marriage had been marked by his absence and his silence, and now, their separation by his constant presence, his constant declaration of his undying devotion and love._

_In her mind, the woman wondered when Jon became the lesser of two evils…wondered that she never acknowledged that feeling until the world felt as if it were finally ending. Her world, at any rate._

_Worn down and exhausted, Alayne found herself seated across from Jon on a grey couch, two feet away from a neatly made queen bed._

_Hotel rooms were perfect places for affairs between strangers, because nothing about hotel rooms were personal. The decor was always frigid, the experience always sterile…_

_Staring at Jon, she understood with startling clarity that from the moment they had met, from the moment he had smiled down at her with that brilliant smile of his, there was nothing impersonal between them. There had never been a moment when she had considered him a stranger._

_Alayne was learning all sorts of things these days; all sorts of lessons she had been avoiding._

_Back pressed against an over-stuffed cushion, the man gazed nervously and expectantly over at Alayne, as she mustered every last iota of courage she possessed. She was scared to say what she needed to say, so very scared, especially because she knew what lay at the end of what she had to tell him. A part of her wished she didn’t need to do this, didn’t need to hasten the inevitable…but it was long past time for either of them to remain in denial._

_Opening her mouth, she began speaking._

_Jon sat in stunned silence, listening to her as she relayed the events of the past two weeks in clinical detail._

_"Are you sure it was..." he trailed off._

_“One hundred percent." she shifted her gaze to look out the window._

_"Why didn't you...Alayne, why didn’t you tell me?" he asked after a moment, looking worriedly at her. “Why did you lie to to me?”_

_"I needed time to think," she heard herself saying._

_He gazed at her in wide-eyed silence, before he pulled her unresisting form into his arms. "I think this is a sign don't you?"_

_She blinked. "A sign of what?"_

_"It's time we told Dany and Harrold the truth. I'm done hiding. I should have been there for you," he started. “I should have been by your side.”_

_"Jon, no," she said very gently. “Besides, I've already told Harrold I want a divorce."_

_"You what? And what do you mean 'no'?" he asked, looking down at her in surprise and burgeoning hope. The accompanying hint of fear that peeked out around the whites of his eyes however, was unmistakeable…and hurt more than she cared to admit._

_“No, your place was not beside me. If anything, this means…this means I can't do this. Not anymore.” she pulled away at last. She couldn't touch him - not now. If she did, she would never want to let go._

_Stubborn denial began to flood Jon’s dark eyes. It was all Alayne could do to meet the intensity of his gaze, but she forced herself not to waver._

_"This is proof we shouldn't be together. I know this sounds stupid, but I get the feeling this is the universe telling us something. That anything coming out of…whatever this thing between us is can only end badly." she ploughed on._

_"Stop it," he tried to reach for her, only to be thwarted as she rose shakily to her feet._

_"Jon, if you left Dany, you would hate yourself for hurting her, and one day, you would hate me for it too," she continued, allowing everything she'd been wanting to say, to finally spill past her lips. “You love her. You know you do. Would you really be able to forgive yourself if you hurt her?”_

_The way he flinched at her every word, the way his gaze began darting this way and that as he tried to block out her logic…it told Alayne that she was doing the right thing._

_“Listen, you're really upset right now, maybe if you calm down..." he got up and moved towards her, looking none too steady himself._

_“Of course I’m upset. I'm trying to tell the man I love we can't be together." she couldn’t keep the tears from welling in her eyes, though it wasn’t from lack of trying. “Jon, we lost our baby. If I had known…if I could have stopped…if there wasn’t a miscarriage…maybe…”_

_She didn’t know how to explain herself. Not properly. If she had known she was pregnant, and if she had been able to keep the child, perhaps she would have gone along with what he wanted._

_Hell, what she had wanted as well, because she wasn’t lying when she said she loved him. They could have had some sort of a life together, if only things hadn’t played out the way they did._

_By then, he had gathered her into a firm embrace. "I'm sorry...I'm so sorry..."_

_"I can't look at you and see any sort of a future,” she admitted. The honesty was sour on her tongue._

_"Stop saying that," he pleaded. "I love you. We can make this work, I swear,"_

_"Five years ago, we might have had a chance, but we missed it. If you had told me what you felt back then, or if I had hung around...maybe we could have succeeded at whatever this is." she wiped at her face, trying once again to move out of the circle of his arms. "Five years ago was the time we should have been together Jon. That time is over."_

_"No, it's not, It can't be over." he insisted. "I refuse to accept that."_

_"You don't get to refuse this," she told him, trying to gather herself. "I can't be with you. I mean it. Not now, not ever again."_

_"Please..." he cupped her cheek and poured everything in his heart into one kiss, clinging to her as if she were his last, existing lifeline. It was a favour she returned as she held tightly to him for one endless moment._

_Knowing it was going to hurt horribly, Alayne wrenched herself away one last time._

_"I didn't say goodbye properly five years ago." she said, looking unflinchingly into his grief stricken eyes. “I’m still sorry about that. I’m always going to be sorry about that. I’m not making that mistake again though…not this time. Goodbye Jon."_

_"Wait, please..." he looked so utterly wrecked, she wanted to die just looking at him. "Just wait..."_

_Alayne didn't wait. She couldn’t afford to._

_Striding out the hotel room, the woman refused to look back, knowing that path was closed to her now._

_Hot tears flooding her vision, the woman stumbled onwards into an uncertain future, armed only with cold satisfaction that at least the path she was carving now, had been carved by her own hand - hers and only hers._

***

Jaime spent the next two days moping in a distracted state, enough so that those around him noticed. The Director went from polite patience, to curt annoyance. His co-stars, sensing his morose disposition, all seemed eager to steer clear of his path.

Tyrion was sympathetic to a point, right until he made a comment about fishes in the sea, and how there were more than one.

“I don’t want another fish,” Jaime bemoaned, nursing a beer in a quiet Irish bar.

“Not now obviously. Maybe not a permanent fish. You could try one of those short term or one night fishes.” Tyrion took a sip of his whisky.

“You might be stretching the metaphor.”

“Did she actually say you guys were done though?” His friend asked curiously. “I mean, given what you said, I’d be surprised if she didn’t, but...”

Glaring at his friend, Jaime chugged his beer, before answering. “Not in so many words. She said she needed a couple of days.”

“Oh. That doesn’t sound that bad,” Tyrion looked thoughtful. “Have you considered making a romantic gesture of some sort? Maybe send flowers with cute emojis stuck everywhere, or maybe send some sort of mariachi band to her office…”

“Have you lost your mind?” The actor demanded. Though his agent had a point; maybe if he stopped feeling sorry for himself, he could do something about getting Sansa to forgive his fuck-up.

Glancing at his phone, he noted that it was likely quitting time for the writer.

“Would it be weird if I just showed up at her place?” He asked aloud, drawing out a few bills from his wallet and leaving them on the small table separating the two men.

“You’re not seriously going to her place unannounced are you?” the smaller man asked, frowning in alarm as Jaime stood up. “I was hoping we could talk about a couple of solid leads that came up in the past few days.”

“Tyrion, I’m gonna be straight with you,” Jaime paused. “I don’t care if I’m the next Patrick Stewart. I _do_ care, however, if I’m working. I do care if I fade into utter obscurity, after working so hard to make something of my career. Does anyone even remember the star of Battlestar Galactica at this point? Or you know, that guy in Babylon 5? I mean fuck…those shows, the actors…they were all fan favourites once. Remember?”

“Jaime…”

“No seriously Ty, I know you want to represent _artists_ , talents with depth, talents who are fucking high-brow…but honestly, most of the time I could care less. Get me roles, auditions…whatever. I’ll work just about anything.” Jaime blinked. “Except porn. Obviously. And commercials for dating sites and detergent. Well commercials in general…though Geico…”

“Ok, yes, I get it.” Tyrion grimaced as he fidgeted guiltily. “I suppose you’re right. I just…”

“I know buddy, I know.” Jaime nodded. “I get it. You want your career to mean something too. I’m asking you both as my agent and as my friend to consider what _I_ want. Please.”

Not giving the other man a chance to answer, Jaime hurried towards the exit. Back at the table he abandoned, Tyrion sighed, rubbing guiltily at his forehead.

***

Jaime wondered if he was going to be that semi-famous actor who got hit with a restraining order. In his mind, he could already see how _E!_ would cover just such an occurrence; he could already envision the sharp, white, shark smiles of the ‘journalists’ as they narrated his troubles.

_“This just in: Jaime Lannister lost his mind recently, after realizing he was a one-tv-show wonder. You might say he lost the literal plot!”_

Loitering in a coffee shop across the street from Sansa’s apartment building, Jaime tried to dismiss the feeling that he was brushing pretty close to stalker territory. Waiting around a woman’s home uninvited was ill-advised to say the least, creepy to say the worst. But still, he couldn’t bring himself to leave.

It was around eight p.m. when he finally caught sight of Sansa approaching the front door of her lobby, at which point, he couldn’t stop his heart from leaping excitedly in his chest. Pushing aside his beverage, Jaime rose to his feet with every intention of closing the gap between himself and the woman he’d been waiting for.

That is, until he caught sight of another man approaching her, also seemingly intent on getting her attention. The stranger was broad shouldered and dressed in a finely tailored grey suit, betraying a certain level of wealth and success that was utterly different from the kind Jaime had achieved in his own life. 

For a moment, Jaime felt his stomach lurching, as he considered irrationally that he was about to replaced by a model Sansa found more suited to her tastes.

Before he could beat a hasty and instinctual retreat, the actor observed as the stranger reached out and grabbed the writer’s arm in a way that seemed just a little too rough to be friendly. Spinning on her heel to face the interloper, Sansa looked as if she were caught between panic and disgust.

Watching as the writer tried unsuccessfully to twist free, Jaime found himself seeing an unfamiliar shade of red. 

Sprinting across the small road separating him from his girlfriend - and no, he wasn’t about to argue with himself about semantics just then - Jaime inserted himself between Sansa and the stranger, breaking apart the altercation that was clearly brewing between the two.

“Get off her _asshole_.” 

Jaime didn’t feel like an action hero. If anything, he was acutely conscious of how corny he sounded as he warned the other man off.

“What the hell? Who is this?” The brute barked, directing his question towards Sansa.

He looked back at Sansa to see her shaking her head at him in warning.

“I’ve got this,” she declared, though there was a frantic spark in her eyes that betrayed the opposite.

“This is between myself and my wife,” the man stated.

“I haven’t been your wife in years Ramsay,” Sansa retorted, in a strangled manner he didn’t recognize. An unfamiliar note of fear and shame in her normally confident voice made Jaime feel sick to his stomach.

Sansa’s ex-husband made a noise at the back of his throat, one that caused Jaime to bristle just a little further. As much as he understood he had inserted himself into something complicated, his resolve was hardening by the second.

“Maybe it’s time we went to my place,” Jaime told Sansa very calmly, though he had yet to take his eyes off Ramsay.

“Seriously who the hell are you?” the other man’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Sansa are you _seeing_ this pretty boy?”

“Alright that’s enough.” Jaime reached down and grabbed his girlfriend’s hand. That seemed to enrage Ramsay, who pulled his fist back.

Before he could throw up his arms to defend himself, Sansa stepped forwards and kicked her ex in the shins. “You’ve hurt me enough, you’re not going to lay a finger on him.”

It was an unlikely moment for Jaime to experience an epiphany but then again, tons of things in life were unlikely. 

Silently, he berated himself for not digging into why Sansa could be so warm and affectionate at times, but so very distant at others. He had been so wrapped up in his own, newfound emotions, it hadn’t occurred to him that she might have had her reasons for not leaping headfirst into a romantic entanglement.

Ramsay looked wounded, albeit not literally, which was rather concerning.

“Sansa, I really think we should try working things out. I’ve learned my lesson, I swear.” he started.

But Jaime was already tugging Sansa towards the curb; given the way she was glaring at her ex, he rather doubted Ramsay’s offer was being received with any measure of warmth whatsoever.

To his relief, a taxi pulled up immediately. Opening the passenger door, Jaime ushered the unresisting woman in. Just as he was about to follow, a heavy hand landed on his shoulder. 

Taking a deep breathe, Jaime forced himself to remember every schoolyard fight he had ever been involved in, right before he turned and slammed his knuckles straight into Ramsay’s nose.

Stunned, the brute fell back, allowing Jaime to climb into the backseat of the car, yelling, “Drive!”

Knuckles tingling and bleeding, the actor looked in awe at his right fist as the taxi raced away. At the wheel, the driver kept on casting strange looks at the couple in his backseat.

“Seven hells! I’m so sorry…” Sansa was hyperventilating, the actor realized with a start. 

“It’s ok…it’s ok,” he repeated, reaching for her hand once again. To his relief, she let him hold it the entire journey.

***

Eight weeks after they started dating, Jaime found himself in the liquor store, scowling hard at the selection of Scotch the place carried.

Generally, he had always wondered why anyone drank the vile stuff at all; in his frank opinion, Scotch was glorified whisky that tasted like ash. 

The fact that the price of Scotch greatly surpassed the cost of bourbon - good bourbon at that - irritated him at a fundamental level. Never mind that he could easily afford bottles of the rancid garbage…it was the principle of the matter that annoyed him to no small degree. 

Still, that very day, Jaime found himself purchasing a bottle of Single Malt to add to his already ludicrous selection of booze.

The only reason he had even purchased it was currently perched on his couch, looking as if she were awaiting some sort of judgment. Pouring her a tot of the peaty liquor, he tipped out for himself, a generous helping of bourbon over ice, figuring it was exactly the right sort of evening where hard alcohol was required and indeed, welcome. 

Practically shoving Sansa’s drink into her hands, Jaime settled beside her, throwing back a mouthful of bourbon as he did so.

“About tonight. I don’t even know how to apologize…” she started, staring down at her drink like she didn’t quite register what it was she was holding.

“You really don’t need to be sorry.” he stated. 

“I kinda do. You got into an fight with my ex, and he’s the reason your hand is still sort of bleeding,” she specified, looking meaningfully at his knuckles. 

Jaime wasn’t exactly sure what he ought to say, until it occurred to him that perhaps, it was time he started being a little more honest about what he was thinking.

“I’m glad I was there. I can’t help but think what could have happened if I hadn’t been.” he admitted.

“Why were you there? Were we supposed to be someplace tonight?” Sansa frowned. 

_Honesty had its drawbacks,_ he decided immediately. 

“I uh.” he cleared his throat and gulped another mouthful of bourbon. “I was kinda. Uh. Waiting for you to get home because I wanted to apologize for what happened the other night. I’ve been freaking out about our fight…”

“Oh,” she looked as if she didn’t quite know what to think. Finally, she took a sip of her whisky. Looking down at her hands, she asked quietly, “I suppose I should explain some stuff.”

“Only if you want,” 

Though he meant that sentiment, Jaime found that he badly wanted to hear her talk, to hear her tell him something about herself he hadn’t yet puzzled out. Especially since he’d done such a terrible job of it up till now. 

“I told you _The Friendship Agreement_ was mostly non-fiction. Mostly.” she drained her tumbler. 

“Ramsay was never a gentle man. Never. Aegon suspected it, which was the real reason he never liked Ramsay. But I wanted to move on from Aeg, wanted a real life, and Ramsay was there. In hindsight, I should have anticipated it, but things got worse after we got married. Much worse. He never…he never really hurt me anywhere obvious. Not where people could see. The few times he did, I always had a story for it, and nobody pried too hard.”

Jaime was finding it incredibly hard to breathe. His fingers were beginning to curl once more, at the thought of that asshole brutalizing the woman in front of him. Over the course of their relationship, the man had come to know the delicate planes of Sansa’s body. He’d come to cherish them, even. The idea that Ramsay had put hands on her made him uncharacteristically murderous.

“Jon figured it out quickly after we…you know.” Sansa hesitated, playing with her empty glass. “Sometimes I think he confused wanting to be a hero with being in love. He wanted me out of that house, out of that marriage. Ramsay eventually found out about the affair when he went through my phone one night, and…”

She looked pained at the memory, enough so that Jaime reached out to place a comforting hand over hers. 

“…he beat the living daylights out of me, enough to put me in the hospital. Which was where they told me I had miscarried a baby because of the injuries I had taken. I ended up calling Aegon, who raced over to see me. I didn’t realize what a mistake that was. Next thing I know, he had driven to our house and gotten himself into a dust-up with Ramsay. When Aeg finally limped back to the hospital, he asked me to leave with him, and I told him ‘no’. I’m not a home-wrecker, not really. That’s when Aeg got angry, and told me it was my fault I lost our baby. He told me I was every bit as culpable as Ramsay.”

Sansa faltered for a moment.

“I found it quite easy after that, to tell him I never wanted to see him again.” she finished.

The actor wondered if quitting the project now would play very badly on his resume. It rankled at him, to realize he was playing a character based on such a selfish and callous individual. What kind of person deliberately inflicted more pain on someone already hurt and suffering? Someone they professed to care about?

“Aegon called almost immediately after…called and called. Left me dozens of messages in my voicemail. I deleted all of them without listening to a single one. There was no point - I loved him, but so what? The damage was done.” Sansa shook her head and set her glass down on his coffee table. Turning at last to look Jaime in the eye, she smiled a watery smile. “There you have it. The ugly, sordid truth. Way less steamy, way more shitty.”

“I’m sorry you had to go through all of that,” he said after a moment, squeezing her hand. “You don’t deserve it. Any of it.”

“That’s a whole separate conversation.” Sansa sighed. “Anyway, Ramsay’s kinda been stalking me ever since I left him. I thought he’d go away after the divorce was finalized. I’ve moved a few times, but somehow he always figures out where I’ve relocated to. Tonight got a bit out of hand…”

“He’s a total dick,” Jaime said with feeling.

“I’m telling you this because I figure you ought to have the benefit of knowing all the details, sordid or not.” Sansa looked fatigued. Nonetheless, she looked at him in a manner that made him feel strangely warm. 

“I really, really like you. You’re kind, and sweet and honestly, it helps that you’re really…really _hot_. I realized after our fight, I’ve been holding back from being a real part of this relationship because…well, obvious complications. But I can’t stop thinking about you when I’m not with you…I had completely forgotten what falling for someone is like, and oh god I’m still talking…”

Jaime’s murderous intentions suddenly dropped right to the very bottom of his list of priorities. 

Outwardly, he nodded understandingly at Sansa. Grinning happily at her seemed like it would be a little on the inappropriate spectrum of things, but the beginnings of a smile were slowly creeping across his features.

“And now that you’ve had some tangible proof how how truly shitty some of those complications are…” the writer sighed. “If you don’t want to see me anymore, I would completely understand.”

“Don’t want to…” he blinked at her. “Why, because you told me something about yourself and your past? Something true?”

“Yes?” she looked at him askance. 

“Sansa, don’t take this the wrong way but…” Jaime scooted closer, and slipped his hand up so it cupped at her soft cheek. “…you’re being utterly ridiculous.”

Eyes narrowing, she glared at him, though there was a hopeful glint under her steely gaze. Pushing past his instinct to duck and hide under her scrutiny, he pushed her hair back.

“I’m serious. I’ve been waiting for you to really open up to me. The parts of you I’ve seen, I’m crazy about…” he murmured. “I can’t see straight when I’m not with you because all I want is to be with you, and when I’m with you, it’s like the rest of the world doesn’t even begin to matter. Sansa, I’ve been falling for you so hard, it’s not even funny. I’m really looking forwards to what comes next.”

“You’re not joking,” she asked in awe, even as he gathered her tightly in his arms. Tentatively, she curled an arm around his neck.

“Not even a little bit. Somethings are going to have to change though.” he grinned. “I really like it when you stay the night, and I like it when I get to take care of you. I want to introduce you to everyone I know as my girlfriend. Hell, I want our picture all over People magazine…”

“Has your picture ever even _been_ in People?” she crooked a brow at him.

 _Point taken_ , he thought with a twinge of annoyance. 

“I want to start building a life with you if you’d let me…”

Slowly, she began to smile a real smile of her own. 

“Ok,” she said at last. “Ok.”

Kissing her once again, Jaime wondered if it was possible for someone to die from too much hope. With her hands tangling themselves in his hair, clinging to him as if he were the only thing keeping her afloat, he found himself wanting to be better for her, to be worthy of her trust, especially knowing now what she’d been through.

For Sansa Stark, Jaime Lannister wanted badly to be a better man than he was.

Emotionally immature as he was, Jaime understood that this wasn’t a happy ending, though certainly, it was a beginning of sorts. A real one. There were going to be days when Sansa was going to have trouble relating to him, and there were going to be moments when he wasn’t sure if he could forge on with someone working through her own, private purgatory. 

Then there was her insane ex-husband, though frankly, he doubted that was a permanent problem…he literally worked in an industry where his peers frequently dealt with overly-zealous fans. There was no doubt in his mind that Ramsay, for all his brutish bravado, would be able to hold his own against professionals who made it their life’s work to deal with assholes like him.

Regardless of what the future held, cradling Sansa gently against him, Jaime knew that this moment was - despite all that had occurred - a good moment. Everything inside of him wanted to create more, better moments with her.

The future held promise, both for the good and for the bad…and for the first time in a long time…

Jaime could hardly wait for tomorrow to start.

**The End**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man. I've been losing myself in some pretty amazingly written Tomione fan fiction lately. It makes me utterly ashamed of the quality of my own writing at this point...just a comment on that anyway.


End file.
